An Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership - An Initiative to Build Nonprofit Board Service Capacity - Johnson Center for ...
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An Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership An Initiative to Build Nonprofit Board Service Capacity MAY 2019 CO-CHAIRS: Tamela Spicer, Program Manager Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy Grand Valley State University Carlos Sanchez, Director Latino Business and Economic Development Center Ferris State University Honorary Co-Chair Deb Bailey Dedicated Community Advocate
Introduction
Nonprofits are vital to healthy communities, providing critical services across a broad spectrum of
issues, enhancing public life, lifting the voices of marginalized populations, and contributing to the
economy. In Michigan alone, nearly 11% of the workforce is employed by nonprofits, organizations
that, by their very mission, empower others to contribute to their community’s vitality in their own way
(Michigan Nonprofit Association, 2014).
By their nature, nonprofits do not exist in a vacuum. They are By their nature,
intrinsically connected to governments, funders, education, nonprofits do
and business in what amounts to an ecosystem of interrelated not exist in a
organizations and individuals. Through aligned purpose and shared
vacuum. They
values, this ecosystem can maximize the good it creates, fostering
inclusive growth and demonstrating how one entity’s success can lead
are intrinsically
to better outcomes for all. connected to
governments,
Yet ecosystems are inherently complex. Changes in one foundation’s funders, education,
funding priorities, for instance, or one nonprofit’s programmatic output
and business in
can influence the availability of, and demand for, a particular service
what amounts
that then impacts others in that arena of work. Nonprofit leadership,
staff and board alike, need to be able to understand these dynamics to an ecosystem
and their role within them in order to develop mission-focused, of interrelated
sustainable organizations. organizations and
individuals.”
A Gap in Nonprofit Leadership
In a time of growing economic inequality, the nonprofit sector is struggling to meet demand for all
types of services (Nonprofit Sector Survey, 2015). While competent staff leadership and reliable revenue
sources are necessary for nonprofit sustainability, “a nonprofit cannot thrive long without strong board
governance” (Meehan III and Jonker, 2018, p. 167).
Despite the critical role that boards play, nonprofit organizations struggle to recruit and develop well-
trained, diverse boards that can positively support organizational effectiveness (Independent Sector,
2015). Many who do serve on boards are often recruited from the first-degree networks of existing board
members (Brennan and Forbes, 2019), often minimizing diversity of thought and representation. Add to
that the challenge that the majority of sitting board members lack a clear understanding of their roles
and responsibilities (BoardSource, 2017).
In order for nonprofits to fulfill their fundamental role of facilitating community responses to
community needs, they must pull from the ecosystem’s full range of stakeholders and provide a
meaningful board experience for these volunteer leaders. Board service is one of the most potent
opportunities for residents to take an active role in building a strong civil society and
addressing the issues they care about. Success requires commitment and capacity
from all sides.
DOROTHY A. JOHNSON CENTER FOR PHILANTHROPY AT GRAND VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY 2Building an Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership
and Board Service Capacity
The Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership project will address this challenge. Designed by a broad cross-
section of the West Michigan community — including businesses, nonprofits, educational institutions,
and philanthropic leaders — this project seeks to develop an innovative approach to strengthening our
civil society by building the capacity of nonprofit organizations to work effectively with diverse board
members and the capacity of those board members to support and shape sustainable organizations.
We believe that building the capacity of organizations to work with diverse board members and the
capacity of a more diverse group of individuals to serve on boards, then creating mechanisms to bring
them together, can effectively address this challenge. Not only will individual nonprofit organizations
benefit, but the entire ecosystem of the community will deepen its capacity for leadership.
After two years of listening and gathering community insights, the Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership
project seeks to:
• Prepare nonprofit organizations to include diverse voices. Incorporating diversity can be
challenging for organizations as they learn to listen well to different ideas, engage various
cultural contexts, and integrate new ways of behaving. It is a complex issue that moves beyond
board composition to “transforming [the] cultural and structural parameters” of how the work
is done (Fredette, Bradshaw, and Krause, 2016, p. 46S).
An organization’s culture, the environment it operates within, and the social capital it
yields, all play a role in board composition (Gazley, and Nicholson-Crotty, 2018; Fredette and
Bradshaw, 2012). Nonprofits must be prepared to move through this complex transformation to
full inclusion.
• Prepare a diverse group of community leaders to serve on boards. Leadership is a question
of influence rather than position. In this effort, we seek to prepare individuals at all levels of
the community to be effective board members who can wield social influence on behalf of
nonprofits and help these organizations maximize their overall mission impact. This will mean
calling upon the entire ecosystem to identify and engage a diverse population for board service.
In the most simplistic form, diversity is merely variety. Having more diverse voices in the room
leads to better decision making and helps avoid groupthink. Research tells us that boards
with both racial/ethnic and gender diversity have more effective governance practices (Buse,
Bernstein, and Bilimoria, 2016).
And while little study has been done on the impact of age diversity in the board room, we do
know that only 17 percent of board members are under the age of 40 (BoardSource, 2017).
Helping the next generation engage in board service requires new ways of thinking and
organizing, as millennials are known to prefer a more hands-on approach in the way they serve
than older generations (Goldseker and Moody, 2017).
DOROTHY A. JOHNSON CENTER FOR PHILANTHROPY AT GRAND VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY 3As the community develops a large, diverse pool of qualified board members it will eventually
reach critical mass. Board members will move from one organization to the next, taking what
they’ve learned and creating increased capacity wherever they go, thus strengthening the
entire ecosystem.
• Create opportunities for connections. Human nature dictates that we tend to gravitate to
people who look like us, think like us, and act like us. The Ecosystem for Nonprofit Leadership
seeks to break this cycle by developing and implementing a program that will forge connections
across the many populations and sectors that interact within our ecosystem. Creating
connections across generations, ethnic groups, socio-economic class, or religious identity, can
bring strength to nonprofit organizations and their ability to positively impact the community.
• Build a replicable, ecosystem-based model for expanding and improving board service.
This project is designed first and foremost to have an immediate, local impact on our West
Michigan ecosystem. However, the fundamental challenge at the heart of this project affects
communities far beyond our own. This project will ultimately seek out mechanisms through
which we can share our learnings and the concrete models and tools that emerge with the
larger field.
Project Plan
Stage One: Identify Actors in the Stage Three: Test Model
Ecosystem & Develop Model March 2020–February 2021
January–July 2019 • Implement training for organizations
• Clarify role and structure of project • Implement training for community
leadership team leaders
• Identify and cultivate necessary • Implement connection events
partnerships
• Ongoing data collection for evaluation
• Design program and evaluation criteria
• Design connection events Stage Four: Evaluate & Disseminate Model
• Secure funding March 2021–December 2021
• Evaluate competencies
Stage Two: Create Training Curriculum
• Evaluate curriculum and training
August 2019–February 2020 delivery
• Identify core competencies necessary • Evaluate model effectiveness
for effective board service
• Disseminate key learnings to broader
• Identify core competencies necessary community and sector
for CEO to effectively work with board
• Develop curriculum at organizational
level and for community leaders
• Finalize connection event model
DOROTHY A. JOHNSON CENTER FOR PHILANTHROPY AT GRAND VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY 4References
BoardSource (2017). Leading with intent: 2017 national index of nonprofit board practices. Washington,
D.C.: Author. Retrieved from https://leadingwithintent.org
Buse, K., Bernstein, R. S., & Bilimoria, D. (2016). The influence of board diversity, board diversity policies
and practices, and board inclusion behaviors on nonprofit governance practices. Journal of Business
Ethics, 133(1), 179–191. DOI:10.1007/s10551-014-2352-z
Fredette, C., Bradshaw, P., & Krause, H. (2016). From diversity to inclusion: A multimethod study of
diverse governing groups. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 45(1_suppl), 28S–51S.
DOI:10.1177/0899764015599456
Gazley, B., & Nicholson-Crotty, J. (2018). What drives good governance? A structural equation model
of nonprofit BoardPerformance. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 47(2), 262–285.
DOI:10.1177/0899764017746019
Independent Sector. (2015). Threads: Insights from the charitable community. Washington, DC: Author.
Retrieved from https://independentsector.org/resource/threads
Meehan III, W. F., & Jonker, K. S. (2018). Engine of Impact: Essentials of Strategic Leadership in the
Nonprofit Sector (p. 167). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Michigan Nonprofit Association (2014). Economic benefits of Michigan’s nonprofit sector. Lansing, MI:
Author. Retrieved from https://www.mnaonline.org/docman/uncategorized/281-economic-
impact-of-nonprofit-sector-2014/file
Nonprofit Finance Fund (2015). State of the nonprofit sector. New York, NY: Author. Retrieved from
https://nff.org/sites/default/files/nff/docs/2015-survey-brochure.pdf
DOROTHY
Dorothy A. JOHNSON
A. Johnson Center CENTER FOR PHILANTHROPY
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