Board meetings are an excellent opportunity for nonprofit directors to discuss a range of issues. These topics can range from evaluating the performance of an organization to discussing future strategies. Nonprofits depend on board members with various backgrounds and have the experience in order to steer them towards success.

To ensure a successful board meeting, it’s crucial that everyone is prepared and has read relevant documentation prior to the time. The agenda should be developed collaboratively and shared in advance so that participants have time to study the materials and prepare for discussion. There is nothing that makes a meeting unproductive as a scramble of people trying to grasp the most important points simultaneously It is vital that agendas for meetings include enough details to allow attendees to fully participate.

The process of establishing clear decision-making guidelines and communicating them to all participants helps the board to align discussions towards an agreed-upon goal. This helps avoid tangential discussions that eat the time of meetings and prevent the board from achieving an agreement or deciding on important issues. Utilizing technology tools that allow real-time collaboration can make it easier for board members to share and communicate documents, even when they are geographically dispersed.

A balanced board member can create an atmosphere that is more productive and help to energize meetings. It is important to select a mix of optimism and pessimism. It is also important to select an amalgamation of both experience and youth. Changes in the location of the meeting or the time of day also aid in energizing the discussion. This is because it will alter the atmosphere of the room and break the monotony of their routines. Finally, evaluating the quality of meetings at least once a year is vital to make improvements. To do this, hand each board member two sticky notes and ask them to assess their overall satisfaction with the meetings on a scale of + (what is good)) to -(what requires paperless board meeting improvement).