Proven strategies for admins to boost board member engagement
Board admins share a common challenge. Keeping their board members engaged, informed and active in their roles can be tricky — whether it’s chasing down meeting RSVPs or making sure that they’re staying on top of board packets.
These are the realities of board administration. The organization’s future as a dynamic, well-funded and effective organization depends on the admin’s ability to keep the board informed, engaged and active. It’s gratifying but at times can be a difficult and relentless job.
The key to success is leveraging technology and modern best practices available to you to improve board engagement (and they’ll even help you save time and be more efficient).
Strategies to better engage your volunteer board members
Audit your processes and eliminate confusion
Every board admin has a set of processes that support the work of the board. And each touchpoint is a potential avenue for board member engagement. What’s your videoconferencing solution? Where do you store your documents? How do your board members interact with board materials? All these questions implicate board member engagement. And it’s not even simply each individual touchpoint — how they relate to each other also affects whether a board member will stay engaged or not.
Going through your administrative systems with a fine-toothed comb — and looking at them through the lens of engagement — will help you know where engagement is strong, and where it could use improvement.
Remember: The first step in improving engagement is having a good sense of the full range of your board’s functioning, warts and all.
Pro tip: Keep board members focused on the overall mission and strategy and look to remove roadblocks and unnecessary steps or practices.
Store documents in a single place
Nothing saps a board’s engagement faster than convoluted document management. Implementing a suite of ill-fitting tools when one, purpose-built tool will do is the antithesis of good board engagement strategy. Storing institutional knowledge in a single, accessible place saves them from wondering if they’re working with the right version of a document or if they’ll have the documents come meeting time.
For example, the International Network of Churches found that having all of its documents in one place helped significantly bolster board member engagement. Using a centralized document library allows every board member to draw on the same source for making decisions, making retrieving knowledge more seamless.
Pro tip: Set up folders and directories based on the document type and topic so board members can quickly find what they are looking for.
Download this how to guide in PDF format here.
Engage from the start with a repeatable onboarding process
Onboarding new members has long been a source of friction for admins and new members. People who are on boards generally have hectic schedules that don’t allow for a full — or even half — day or training and orientation. As a result, both admins and the new members are dealing with a scattered process. Using technology like BoardEffect software completely transforms that process. You can quickly and easily build self-guided training modules that allow new members to work at their own pace — and on their own schedule.
At Presbyterian SeniorCare, for instance, they use BoardEffect and a 6-step process covering everything from welcome packets to training modules on supporting technology to one-on-one mentoring sessions. Getting new people up to speed is a great way to boost engagement, as most new board members have great energy and passion when they join.
“BoardEffect makes it easy to keep resources up to date and maintain, keeping documents current for new members to access… I have received so much positive feedback from new members by making the process self-guided and virtual. One new trustee said, ‘this was the best orientation I ever had.’” - Elizabeth Thompson, Executive Assistant to the President & Corporate Secretary, Presbyterian SeniorCare Network
Pro tip: Set up a system of regularly checking in on your board members during their first few weeks and showing them appreciation.
Redesign meetings for efficiency
You need board members to show up to meetings fully engaged. But laborious meeting protocols and processes sap attention and energy, making it hard for board members to stay on task. Board software like BoardEffect helps admins create stronger, more focused agendas and meeting books — with all necessary appendices and addenda in one place. The RSVP function also encourages attendance and helps maintain quorum, supporting a more concentrated and effective board. By tracking RSVPs in BoardEffect, the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry found that they were able to boost their engagement rate by 90–95%.
Board software tools like BoardEffect also give you the option of conducting in-person, online or hybrid meetings. Members who miss meetings can quickly review summaries and get up to speed quickly. BoardEffect also offers meeting enhancements, like secure messaging between board members.
Redesigning your meetings, from streamlined agendas to convenient board packets delivered direct to board members on whatever device they choose, enables board members to focus on the business in front of them. Meeting time should be spent aligning organizations to their mission — not searching endlessly for critical documents.
Pro tip: Use BoardEffect’s surveys for Conflict of Interest administration and to efficiently vote on issues.
Leverage collaboration between meetings
Board members use digital collaboration tools in their day jobs. They’re accustomed to finding what they need instantly, creating documents quickly and securing sharing them with others for review and refinement. Proving your board with the same kind of digital tools makes them productive, more collaborative and more engaged.
Solutions such as BoardEffect offer collaborative workrooms for committee and taskforce projects, secure messaging and digital storage, all helping to transform board dynamics. As your board members grow proficient with these tools, you’ll find that other features — like surveys and polling — are even more effective to keep board members engaged and focused on delivering in their roles.
Pro tip: Promote seasonal events and webinars to keep board members engaged between meetings.
Communicate clearly and effectively
The right technology can also help admins inspire board member in new ways. For example, you can use your board management software to share relevant news articles, send push notifications, message members regarding outstanding tasks, send meeting reminders, collect RSVPs and secure approvals. Creating one central place for all communication, documentation and collaboration, means you’re likely to inspire board members to engage more and work together more effectively.
Pro tip: Use the BoardEffect newsfeed to keep members up to speed with the latest information, enhance communication, and improve engagement of volunteer boards.
Offer upskilling and networking opportunities
People typically join boards to contribute to causes they believe in — and expand their own skills and experience. Digital board tools provide easy avenues for this kind of learning, by connecting board members with training, information and their peers. You can also provide connections to organizations that offer formal training and certification programs through your board software, for example, BoardEffect users can also access certifications through the Diligent Institute for key training from cybersecurity to artificial intelligence (AI).
Pro tip: Share local networking opportunities and leverage the unique skill set and experiences of each board member. Encourage cross-learning and sharing among board members.
Start leveraging board technology to better engage volunteer board members
A more engaged board is a more effective board. Admins across all board types spend a good portion of their workweeks trying to deepen engagement and drive better organizational outcomes. Deploying a purpose-built solution, like BoardEffect, for mission-driven boards gives admins more tools and more time to drive deep engagement.
BoardEffect allows you to accomplish big things, like curating central digital document storage, streamlining onboarding, enabling peer collaboration, supporting hybrid or virtual meetings, empowering new fundraising strategies and deploying strong cybersecurity. It also offers helpful small touches, like in-meeting messaging, digital sticky notes for annotating board material, automated RSVP management and member polling and surveys.
With a centralized document library, board members using BoardEffect can access the right data at the right time for better decision-making. This same library also helps make onboarding a simpler, more consistent experience by housing all training materials in one place.
The board administrator for Starfish Family Services noted that “board members feel a greater sense of urgency when they receive an email through the BoardEffect platform, rather than from their work email address.”
Make the move to a dedicated board solution today
Board engagement will always be a work-in-progress for board administrators as members come and go. And, as mission-driven organizations strive to accelerate fundraising, attract diverse talent and deepen engagement, the need for new technologies and refined best practices will only become more acute. For boards who have not yet made the move to BoardEffect, the time for a strategic review is now. Schedule a demo today.
