Recapping quickly and moving on —<\/p>\n
My last blog posed a governing board of 3, who would be certified through a formal vetting process, and then become responsible for insuring that the public interest is being served by the incorporated arts organization. These duties would include fiduciary responsibility, management oversight and assessing the extent to which the stated mission of the organization is being accomplished. The question to address now is whether individual donors would be as inclined to give if they did not serve on governing boards, assuming for the sake of argument that they would not choose to enter the certification process.<\/p>\n
Short of real research, I have asked a number of these individuals whom I know how they would react to such a new construction. Their answers group nicely in two domains. The first: “Whew! It would be a relief to be able to support “my” organizations without having to deal with those issues that dominate board and committee meetings.” And the second, ” I’m not so sure that I would trust the people on the 3-person governing board to manage my money. I want direct access to how it is utilized.”<\/p>\n
Since this anecdotal “research” is consistent with literature concerning not-for-profit fund development, I feel comfortable addressing my collected “data.”<\/p>\n
The “Whew” group should not be dismissed an unproblematic. Donors become donors because they experience a true closeness and deep involvement in an organization and with its mission. If there were a 3-person certified fiduciary board, then organizations would need to find additional creative ways to involve their individual donors. Perhaps what would be lost without attendance at board and board committee meetings would be regularity of exposure. Current volunteer programs at a number of large organizations could provide some initial ideas for maintaining regular and creative involvement. <\/p>\n
The “I’m not so sure” group, the skeptics, could and would only be reassured if one of them, or ones close to them served on the 3-person board. And, also if over time, the 3-person model proved itself highly effective. My experience with those in this “I’m not so sure” group is that they are sharp and deeply committed to “their” organizations’ successes. I would strongly urge them to go through the certification process and serve on the fiduciary board.<\/p>\n
A next step in moving forward with these ideas would be to develop the certification model, then vet it across the NFP arts sector. I’m familiar with the various excellent seminars and short courses for board members, but not with any certification programs. I’d be grateful to readers here if they know of anything along these lines from other professional sectors. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Recapping quickly and moving on — My last blog posed a governing board of 3, who would be certified through a formal vetting process, and then become responsible for insuring that the public interest is being served by the incorporated arts organization. These duties would include fiduciary responsibility, management oversight and assessing the extent to which the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-351","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}