Six ways to keep your trustees on board

The chair needs to foster an environment in which diverse views can be freely aired. Photograph: Alamy

In any organisation, be it a charity, social enterprise, social business or housing association, the effectiveness of the board doesn’t just depend on who is sitting round the table, but also how engaged they are. If a board is disinterested it can’t provide the financial and strategic scrutiny needed.

So whether you are someone who regularly deals with a board, a chair, board member, or a prospective trustee, here are some tips to keep trustees fully involved:

Tell them how they’re doing

Feedback is essential if you are to encourage people’s best contributions. Photograph: Radius Images/Alamy

Board members’ reviews are crucial and they should be regular, honest and thorough. Give feedback to trustees individually on their role and collectively about ways in which the board could work better together.

The board should be as professional as the rest of the organisation. Consider annual appraisals supported by peer reviews, and board assessments to monitor its effectiveness. The outcomes can inform future priorities and objectives.

Related: Kids Company closure: lessons for trustees in the charity sector

If someone is failing to attend, tackle the issue head-on. Many organisations follow a three strikes policy.

Introduce the board to those the charity works with

You can’t explain an organisation to someone without letting them meet the people at the heart of it. Photograph: Everett Collection /Rex Feature

Encourage trustees to get out and meet supporters, volunteers and beneficiaries. The more of a link they feel to what the organisation is doing, the more involved trustees are likely to become.

Reserve space on each meeting’s agenda to highlight and celebrate exactly what the organisation is achieving – focus on evidence or case studies which are about outcomes as well as outputs. If you can’t prove you’re making a positive difference, the board is reduced to being a talking shop.

Explain the benefits

Being a trustee isn’t a walk in the park... Photograph: Alamy

You need to be clear what it is you can offer potential trustees and emphasise your organisation’s wider appeal and brand capital. Stress the networks they’ll be exposed to via fellow trustees and the challenges or professional kudos that comes with being on a board.

Make sure to point out that the organisation they’re joining really makes a difference, as well as the fact that their own insight, experience and intelligence can help to create a more effective, well-positioned enterprise.

You’ll only get real results from a well-chaired board

Chairs needs to be forceful if everyone is going to have their contributions heard. Photograph: Phil Noble/Reuters

Chairs should make sure everyone has the space to speak, take on board a range of views, and ensuring meetings are kept to time. The best chairs should be adept at working outside of the boardroom, listening, anticipating and influencing. They are self-aware, able to accept criticism and focused on their growth and that of the board.

The chair also needs to foster an environment in meetings in which all views can be freely aired and comprehensively debated, and decisions are taken openly and following proper debate.

Don’t waste their time with badly planned meetings

An ill-planned meeting will lose hard-won goodwill from trustees. Photograph: Kohei Hara/Getty Images

Given that trustees are likely to be busy it’s important to be organised. Circulate meeting schedules and briefing papers well ahead of time and stick to the agenda and timetable. Hurried trustees need to know the meeting will stick to time.

Similarly, trustees will disengage if everything appears sewn up before the discussion has begun or gets unpicked in the corridor after it has finished. The role of the chair is critical in avoiding these sorts of behind the scenes deals and ensuring that thorny issues are aired and treated with due care.

Take advantage of their expert knowledge, but don’t ignore their broader views

People don’t fit into boxes – experience can inform decision making in a wide range of areas. Photograph: Roberto Pfeil/AP

Trustees are often hired because of their functional or technical expertise (legal, financial, communications etc). However, it is dangerous to compartmentalise them. If trustees are only asked to offer their views along a single narrow remit, they can lose interest and the organisation can lose the benefit of their broader know-how.

Trustees join a board to participate, so ensure that all board members are involved in decisions. That’s why the most effective boards are those that are not a homogeneous group of similar individuals, still less a collection of people recruited from the same social or professional networks as the organisation’s chief executive. If they’re to be effective, trustees need to remember that it is their job – indeed, their statutory duty – to ask difficult questions and demand clear answers.