1. Doug Eadie & CompanyDoug Eadie & Company
Building High-Impact
Board-Chief Executive
Leadership
www.DougEadie.com

2. A Keynote Presentation For:
Association Executives Of North
Carolina
Annual Meeting
July 14, 2014
Doug Eadie & CompanyDoug Eadie & Company

3. Doug Eadie & CompanyDoug Eadie & Company
The Board-Savvy CEO:
Building A High-Impact Partnership
With Your Board of Directors

5. QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
1. What appear to be your board’s most significant
strengths and weaknesses as your association’s
governing body? What does your board tend to do
best – and least well – when it governs?
2. Over the past year or so, what have been the most
important two or three governing accomplishments
of your board (not of the association generally)?
3. What appear to be the most important governing
issues facing your association?
Doug Eadie & Company

6. Part 1
Overview Of The Board-Savvy
CEO
Doug Eadie & Company

7. 4 Facts Of Life In All
Organizations
1. Surviving and thriving as a CEO depends on a rock-
solid board-CEO partnership.
2. Board-CEO partnerships are difficult to build and
always fragile.
3. Board members make better partners when they are
actively engaged in making high-impact governing
decisions and judgments and, therefore, feel like
satisfied owners of their governing work – NOT like
an audience for finished staff work.
4. Board-savvy CEOs are the most effective partnership
builders.
Doug Eadie & Company

8. Board-Savvy CEOS
• See the board as one of their association’s most
precious assets and take accountability for
capitalizing on the asset.
• Are world-class experts in the rapidly evolving
field of association governance.
• Treat governance and the board-CEO partnership
as a top-tier CEO priority.
Doug Eadie & Company

9. QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
1. What resources do board members bring to the
boardroom that make them a precious association
asset?
2. What can a CEO do to become a true expert in the
field of association governance?
Doug Eadie & Company

10. Making Governing A Top CEO
Priority Means:
• Spending at least 25 percent of his/her time on
governing matters
• Serving as “executive director” of the
association’s board “program:”
Closely monitoring board functioning, identifying
issues needing attention and taking the lead in
addressing them
Helping the board become a more effective governing
body
Doug Eadie & Company

11. 3 Board-Savvy CEO Hats
 CHIEF BOARD CAPACITY BUILDER: Taking the
initiative in getting the board to strengthen its governing
capacity
• CHIEF GOVERNING PROCESS DESIGNER:
Continuously working with board standing committees
in designing processes for board involvement that turn
board members into satisfied owners of their governing
work.
• CHIEF GOVERNING RELATIONSHIP MANAGER:
Paying close attention to communication and interaction
processes aimed at keeping the board-CEO working
relationship healthy.
Doug Eadie & Company

12. Part 2
The Board-Savvy CEO As
Chief Board Capacity Builder
Doug Eadie & Company

13. Governing Is A Team Sport
Involving A
“STRATEGIC GOVERNING
TEAM”
• Board
• CEO
• Senior executives
Doug Eadie & Company

14. The Strategic Governing Team
Has A Clear Choice:
• Either take the initiative in continuously
developing the board – strengthening its
composition and updating its role, structure, and
processes in the interest of higher-impact
governing
-OR--OR-
• Merely move today’s board into the future
Doug Eadie & Company

15. QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
1. What practical steps can the CEO take to get the
board interested in – and committed to –
strengthening its capacity to govern?
2. What hurdles might a CEO have to overcome in
getting the board committed to capacity building,
and what might the CEO do to get over these
hurdles?
Doug Eadie & Company

16. 3 Key Elements Of Board
Capacity Building
1. Strengthening the board’s self-management
capacity
2. Clarifying the board’s governing work
3. Updating the board’s governing structure
Doug Eadie & Company

17. Board Self-Management
Involves Both
Developing theDeveloping the
people on the boardpeople on the board
Managing theManaging the
board’s governingboard’s governing
performanceperformance
Doug Eadie & Company

18. Practical Ways To Strengthen
The People On The Board
1. Make a board standing committee (typically governance
or board operations) responsible for board human
resource development.
2. Avoid the slippery slope of board downsizing.
3. Enrich the board’s composition by using a detailed,
formal profile in filling board vacancies – identifying
desirable board member attributes and qualifications
and explicitly targeting sectors/stakeholder
organizations that need to be represented on the board.
4. Systematically develop board members’ governing
knowledge and skills.
Doug Eadie & Company

19. Managing Board Governing
Performance Involves
• An accountable committee (typically
governance or board operations)
• Setting board member performance
targets/standards and monitoring
performance
• Periodically assessing how the board as a
whole is performing as a governing body
• Taking corrective action as appropriate
Doug Eadie & Company

20. QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
1. What are some desirable attributes and
qualifications of board members?
2. What steps might you take to diversify your board’s
composition in order to make the board a stronger
organizational resource?
3. What are some governing performance targets/
standards that board members might be held
accountable for?
Doug Eadie & Company

21. Governing At The Highest Level
To play the leading role – in partnership
with the CEO and executive team – in
continuously answering 4 critical questions:
1. Where should we be headed/what should we become
over the long run?
2. What should we be now and in the near-term?
3. How well are we performing: in terms of member
service delivery, finances, external relations,
administration?
4. How do we need/want to be perceived by our
members and key stakeholders?
Doug Eadie & Company

22. The Board’s Detailed Governing
Work Consists Of Much More Than
Mere “Policy-Making”
Decisions about concrete governing “products” and
judgments based on governing information – flowing
along 3 broad governing streams:
Strategic and operational planning/budget developmentStrategic and operational planning/budget development
Performance oversight/monitoringPerformance oversight/monitoring
External/stakeholder RelationsExternal/stakeholder Relations
Doug Eadie & Company

23. Warning!
Distinguish between – and never mix up:
•Your board’s true governing work
•And the non-governing “doing” work that board
members might validly engage in
And make sure that non-governing work is
not allowed to encroach on the board’s
preeminent responsibility: Governing.
Doug Eadie & Company

24. QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
1. What are some of the most important governing
“products” in the area of strategic and operational
planning that boards make decisions about?
2. What are some examples of important non-
governing work that board members might validly
engage in?
Doug Eadie & Company

25. Well-Designed Board
Governing Committees
Ensure thorough preparationEnsure thorough preparation
for board meetingsfor board meetings
Foster board memberFoster board member
governing expertise,governing expertise,
ownership and egoownership and ego
satisfactionsatisfaction
Provide the CEO with spearProvide the CEO with spear
carriers/championscarriers/champions
Serve as reliable vehicles forServe as reliable vehicles for
keeping the board’s detailedkeeping the board’s detailed
governing work updatedgoverning work updated
Doug Eadie & Company

26. Well-Designed
Governing Committees
• Correspond to the major streams of decisions and
judgments that make up your board’s governing work
(form following function)
• Cut across all of your association’s operations and
functions (not tied to narrow programmatic and
administrative silos, such as education, certification,
personnel, or finance)
• Are standing, not ad hoc, committees
• Consist only of board members, along with staff in a
support role
Doug Eadie & Company

27. Form Follows Function
Board Governing StreamsBoard Governing Streams
Programs and Functions
Planning StreamPlanning Stream
Performance Oversight StreamPerformance Oversight Stream
External/Stakeholder Relations StreamExternal/Stakeholder Relations Stream
Doug Eadie & Company

28. Model Committee Structure
Doug Eadie & Company
External/Stakeholde
r
Relations
Board
Performance
Oversight/Monitoring
Planning and
Development
Governance
(Board Operations)

29. Governance (Board Operations)
Committee
• Headed by board chair
• Consists of other standing committee chairs
and CEO
• Serves as committee on board operations,
not as a petite board: coordinating
committee work, developing the board
agenda, managing the board-CEO
partnership, overseeing board performance
Doug Eadie & Company

30. Committees Function Well
When
• Every board member serves on 1 and only 1
committee (except committee chairs)
• Committees are the only path to the full
board agenda and only committees report in
full board meetings (except the CEO’s
report)
• Committee chairs and members are
regularly rotated among committees
• An executive manager is assigned as chief
staff to each committee
Doug Eadie & Company

31. Common Board Development Vehicles
• Very Effective:
 Board-staff governance retreat with follow-up report
 Governance task force that makes recommendations
to the board
• Less effective:
 Consultant study and recommendations
 CEO study and recommendations
Doug Eadie & Company

32. Other governance books
by
Doug Eadie offered by
Governance Edge
Publications
To order:
www.GovernanceEdge.com
The
indispensable
guidebook for
building higher-
impact board
leadership and a
solid
board-CEO
partnership.
Provides tested,
practical guidance
for managing the
emotional and
psychological
dimension of the
CEO-board
relationship.
Doug Eadie & Company

33. Doug Eadie & CompanyDoug Eadie & Company
www.DougEadie.com
Doug@DougEadie.com 800.209.7652