The Top Ten Reasons to Use Policy Governance

Being the best you can be as an organization is the intention of every volunteer Board of Directors and every Executive Director. Getting to be the best is neither easy nor natural for either the Board or the senior staff person. Choosing to use policy governance is one way that an organization can move towards its best. There are 10 good reasons to for an organization to use policy governance.

1. It’s a Framework for the normal. There are many relationships with multiple levels, and different roles and responsibilities of the people in any organization. Finding a framework that defines these normal relationships, roles and responsibilities of the people is essential. Policy governance provides such a framework within which the people in an organization relate and actions of these people happen in a normal or theoretical way.

2. It’s a Framework for crisis. Within a complex, that is any, organization the normal will regularly move to the abnormal. This is called ‘life’.  Organizations which do not have the crisis mode defined will find that this critical state simply takes over. When there becomes less normality and more crisis – often called in the fire rather than the preferable frying pan, the organization descends into an unproductive state.  Policy Governance provides a framework within which the people and actions in an organization practically happen and relate – even in crisis.

3. The expectations of the Executive Directors are clear. The relationship of volunteers on the Board of Directors to their senior staff is a critical one for every organization. The volunteers must be able to verbalize their clear, corporate expectations for performance of the Executive Director. These expectations include both the outcomes and the process to the Executive Director.  Without these explicit expectations, the Executive Director and the volunteers could function at odds to each other - to the detriment of the organization. Policy Governance allows the volunteers to express their expectations of the Executive Director.

4. The Executive Director and the volunteers can do their work well.  When volunteers and professional Executive Directors work together, the language they speak is often different and not understood by each other. This may be particularly true when a ‘generic’ Executive Director is hired who does not come from the same culture as the volunteers. When two people speak a different language, the opportunity for misinterpretation is high. Policy Governance gives the volunteers and senior staff a common language with which to communicate well.

5. Everyone knows the game. The behaviour in an organization can be likened to that of a game. In both an organization and a game, there are specific relationships, purposes, penalties and reasons behind the actions. When these are all crystal clear the game plays well; when everyone wants to be in goal and no one knows when anyone scores the game is a mess. The analogy holds true for organizations too. Policy governance defines the rules and roles, the purposes and penalties for the game of running an organization.

6. So you know why the organization is doing what it does.  Most organizations write a mission statement but they fail to base this on underlying values, philosophy, beliefs etc. When these underlying principles are missing, the mission is weak and the work of the organization is weakened.  Policy Governance provides the way to relate the core principles of an organization to what it is actually doing.

7. So you know how you’re doing.  One of the most difficult jobs in life is to stop and evaluate how things went. Everyone likes to dream up the plan and most even like putting the plan in place. What most of us find difficult is stopping to purposefully assess what we did.  Without this assessment, the project is not complete.  Policy Governance requires the organization to include evaluation as a part of completing the work.

8. So there is a big picture. For most people, counting paper clips is lots more fun and satisfying that working on the larger and often more difficult decisions. These larger decisions that define the big picture are often left undefined because they are perceived as being to time consuming, difficult, boring, etc etc for Boards of Directors to define.  When the big picture is ignored or left to staff to define, and the volunteers deal with the details, the vital whole picture is missing or out of kilter. Policy Governance insists on having the big picture defined so that the details can fit in appropriately and consistently.

9. So the organization learns. To be a learning organization remains a worthy goal for most organizations.  At whichever stage of development organizations find themselves, the anticipating of corporate actions and the learning from corporate mistakes are the basis of a learning organization.  Finding and using a model for governance in an organization is something that all organizations much do.   Policy Governance, when chosen for the right reasons and when it is well implemented, is the best way for an organization to move to being a learning organization.

10. So you know when you’re done it. Finding the milestones of success along the way in an organization’s work is essential. When success is marked everyone is encouraged, the path is clearly marked, correction can be made to keep to the course. When there are no clear delineations of success, it is easy for an organization to veer from its goals. Policy Governance gives a compass to organizations, both the incentive and the way, to keep on track.

Many organizations would not disagree with the value of using Policy Governance. Some organizations could even cite these Top Ten Reasons as why they should use Policy Governance. Unfortunately, many do not take the steps to make their agreement into commitment and implement true Policy Governance. The organizations which take the steps of commitment to Policy Governance will tell you the story of their success. 

Carol Humphries is currently the Executive Director with the Reflexology Association of Canada and an associate with AXI. Carol is a passionate advocate of Policy Governance having used this model as a director and staff person at many different levels and types of organizations. As a consultant, Carol has helped international, national, provincial and local organizations to embrace Policy Governance.

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