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Useful Skills for Board Members to Have
There are no hard and fast rules about exactly what experience and skills potential board members should have. Sometimes individuals with limited prior experience can quickly learn to be excellent board members. But generally there are some prior skills that are desirable in a board member.
Financial Skills
Oversight of the college’s finances is one of the board’s most important collective duties. Board members are required to regularly review and evaluate financial statements that are provided at board meetings. These provide information about the college’s financial state. Board members also have a legal and ethical “fiduciary duty” to act in the best interests of the organization, including when finance-related decisions are made.
So, if you are comfortable with numbers, have a good head for finances, or if you have prior experience running a business and understanding financial statements, this will probably be a plus. You might want to note this background in any application materials or statements of interest that you may submit.
If you don’t have this kind of expertise, this does not necessarily rule you out as a potential board member. But you will need to do additional homework and preparation work, to familiarize yourself with the general principles involved in reviewing financial information. Various training resources, including reading materials and online videos, are available if you are in this category. All board members must collectively participate in financial oversight, and should be comfortable with that role.
While governance roles are varied, and while board members without financial skills can sometimes contribute other useful skills, financial oversight is a key component of a typical board member’s work. So overall, if you are just not comfortable with this financial oversight role, then you may want to think very carefully before submitting a statement of interest.
Supervisory or Human Resources Experience
Although not essential, supervisory experience, or prior experience in human resource domains, are good skill sets to have for potential members of the Community Board. For example, board members are responsible for overseeing and evaluating the work of the college’s Executive Director each year. If you have had prior experience managing and supervising employees in other contexts then you may be familiar with these kinds of processes. Board members may also be potentially responsible for developing and reviewing policies for a range of “human resource” matters – things like payscales, benefits, hiring policies and so on. If you have experience in any of these areas, for example if you have worked as a manager in other organizations and have experience supervising other staff, that would be useful experience on which to draw.
Board members may also sometimes be called upon to work collectively to make “final decisions” about some employment-related matters, or about student appeals relating to academic progress. If you have any experience in these kinds of areas, this may be useful.
Planning or Project Management Experience
If you have had previous experience in other organizations working on long term changes designed to improve organizational functioning, or if you have done previous strategic planning work or worked in project management, then these are also good skills to have. Again, these are skills that can be learned while you participate, with some effort on your part.
"Plays Well With Others"
Board membership may include listening to lots of group discussions and making contributions in debates about matters affecting the college. Sometimes there will be differences of opinion. As a board member you should be comfortable giving your input collegially in situations that involve debates, arguments, discussion, and votes on sometimes difficult decisions.
You should be comfortable expressing your opinions in group settings, and also doing so in collegial ways in interactions, even with folks who may disagree with you.
Board members are all considered peers during their governance work, and every board member has an opportunity to participate in all aspects of the process. Collegial interpersonal dynamics among the peer members of the board are essential for the successful functioning of this kind of peer-based group. Maintaining this kind of collegial group dynamic is one of the roles of the chair of the board.