he Ideal Size For Your Nonprofit Board of Directors - The Case For Board Development
By: nikky Howard
Submitted: 2010-07-02 23:34:00 | Word Count: 719
Ideal board size varies based mostly on 3 things:
1. The dimensions of the organizational budget, staff, and constituency; 2. The nature of the organization's mission and constituency; and 3. The expected role of the board as defined in bylaws (are they a classic "policy" board, a hands-on "working" board, or a mix of the two?)
Initial, solely in exceptional circumstances should a board ever exceed twenty one members in size.
At this size, I would start questioning the effectiveness and efficiency of such a large board. It might be that a separate Advisory Board or Trustees Board would higher serve your purpose. This might be combined with a smaller govt committee to truly conduct the continuing board business on an everyday basis. This method could ultimately serve the organization higher while still recruiting the large names needed to provide the board clout and giving your a lot of native constituency an energetic voice.
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On the opposite end, I would never recommend a Board size of but five members. From my perspective, the only time a board size of but 5 is acceptable is when submitting your original Application for Recognition of Exemption Under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code (IRS Form 1023). A board size of at least 3 should ensure that the application will not receive any extra scrutiny. Smaller boards could have a larger problem representing their constituency and have additional potential for internal conflicts of interest. Accountability may be converted into a priority as well.
But once more, there are various exceptions. Some organizations would like giant boards as a result of abundant of their support depends on the public and large donor relationships. Other agencies, like human and social services suppliers, with most of their funding limited to a smaller variety of contracts and/or major grant sources are usually higher off with smaller boards.
The organization's expectations of the board play a key role... the board of an advocacy organization or professional association, with a massive, additional numerous, and more geographically dispersed constituency could would like to feel more connected with the organization and might have a legitimate reason for the larger board.
A "policy" board, in an exceedingly well-run organization with an executive director who understands board relations, could safely be larger, as the quantity of your time such a board attracts from skilled govt leadership is sometimes smaller.
Boards that are centered on policy and are active fundraising boards and a mid-size board is sort of continuously better. This kind of board can utilize additional leadership time and can usually be additional active than a policy board. Incidentally, this can be what I advocate most boards to strive to become.
A board that gives a ton of professional-level support through legal, accounting, and program experience, should typically be as tiny as reasonably possible, since it can be a considerable drain on the executive director to interact with board members. It is important that this kind of board be manageable by the manager director therefore as to allow time to nurture the simplest potential contributions from all members.
The ideal board size is sort of continuously somewhere between seven and 15 members, not withstanding the exceptions listed above. Too tiny a board is nearly certainly as unhealthy as too large a board. 5 members or less may be inadequate to accomplish all of the board's tasks and to recruit the range of abilities required to be effective. Seventeen members or additional could create difficulties in reaching a consensus and become overly bureaucratic.
Another comment, notice that each one board sizes were odd numbers (3, five, seven, fifteen, seventeen, twenty one, etc) no matter how tiny or massive the board. It's best to stay your board and to grow your board to continually maintain an odd number of members. This can help to avoid ties in voting and facilitate the board to be additional effective in reaching conclusive votes.
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Nik has been writing articles online for nearly 2 years now. Not only does this author specialize in Non-Profit , you can also check out his latest website about:
