I recently came upon a rare occurrence, even for a small organization:  the chair of a board wanted to read a proposal document before it was submitted.  In the age of pushing staff professional leadership, it was refreshing.  Is it necessary?  I think the answer depends upon current board-staff relationship culture, expectations and agreements.

If a mature development program exists, and designated members of the board are routinely informed of major activities, including grant/contract/sponsorship proposals, it may not be necessary for a trustee to read an application.  If the organization is extremely small, the staff inexperienced and the board has talent and time, it makes sense to have board review.  A corollary to this situation is one where the board has trust issues with top management or the development staff. 

However, there is one situation that always calls out for board review, where the niche and organizational culture and operations will be dramatically altered with a new funding source.  Hopefully, the very development of such proposals will be sanctioned by the board and further review of actual documents may not be needed.  If proposals of this type are submitted by staff without sufficient board engagement, board-staff trust and the ability of the board to manage the service niche on behalf of the community can be severely compromised.

Comments

Add New Search

Write comment
Name:
Email:
Title:
UBBCode:	-color-aquablackbluefuchsiagraygreenlimemaroonnavyolivepurpleredsilvertealwhiteyellow -size-tinysmallmediumlargehuge
	Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.

Powered by !JoomlaComment 3.22

3.22 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."