Need some input from readers on 'How to Provide Mission-Focus' with board members

Good morning, DonorDreams readers!
This is part three  in a five part series that I started last week with two posts titled:

If you’ve read the previous two blog posts, you know I’m trying to write an eBook on the topic of “How to Engage Board Volunteers.” So far, I’ve taken my inspiration from an old favorite training curriculum titled “Inspiring & Managing Your Board for Fundraising Success,” and I’ve divided my eBook into the following sections:

  • Setting Expectations
  • Accountability & Urgency
  • Planning
  • Mission-focus
  • Organizational Best Practices

Within these sections, I want to provide samples and explanations of tools and practices that successful non-profit leaders use to keep their board volunteers engaged.*
The following set of tools (probably better characterized as ‘practices’) are ones I’ve identified as being effective in helping create “mission-focus:”

  • Inviting volunteers to tour your organization’s programming during hours of operation
  • Bringing clients into the boardroom in-person, via video or through an activity (e.g. asking clients to put together a Wish List for your organization during the holidays as if they were writing a letter to Santa and sharing those lists with board members so they can see things through your clients’ eyes)
  • Staff presentations in the boardroom focused on a program or need
  • Involving board members in a strategic program opportunity (e.g. judging a contest or client competition)
  • Infusing storytelling into your organization culture and use it as a vehicle to help volunteers discover mission-focused stories they are passionate about sharing with others

What other tools or practices have you used to clearly communicate ideas such as:

  • Why a board member or volunteer is passionate about your mission?
  • What’s happening outside of the boardroom throughout your organization?
  • Why the organization is so important to those you serve?

Please take a minute out of your busy schedule to provide some feedback. Your suggestions on additional tools is also greatly appreciated.
Here’s to your health!
Erik Anderson
Founder & President, The Healthy Non-Profit LLC
www.thehealthynonprofit.com 
erik@thehealthynonprofit.com
http://twitter.com/#!/eanderson847
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http://www.linkedin.com/in/erikanderson847
*Note: I would be extremely grateful if you would share your best organization’s resources for possible inclusion as a sample in my eBook. If you are concerned about organizational privacy/confidentiality, I am more than willing to redact your organization’s name from whatever documents you provide if that is what you desire.

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