Question #43 – Does Your Board Set Criteria for Measuring Board Success?

Rick Maloney

(49 Questions to Ask Your Board)

High-performing boards are characterized by a number of observable behaviors. They know what their job is, and they do it efficiently. They plan their own work and perform their work at the policy level, focusing more on organizational outcomes than process. They are responsible for their own performance; they follow their own rules and deal fairly and consistently with staff and each other. They set the vision for themselves and the organization. They clearly understand the separation of responsibilities between their work and the work of the CEO. They are in touch with the ownership, to which they are accountable.

― Randy Quinn and Linda Dawson1

Board performance, in a word, is governance. The first step in self-assessment is to identify what criteria are used to monitor board performance and determine board success. Criteria for effectiveness in the board’s governance role make clear what should be monitored.

Scenario: A very strong board chair dominated the board culture. He had been the chair of the board for a number of years. He told the board that he and the superintendent always “work things out.” No one on the board ever challenged him. A consultant facilitating a board retreat raised several governance issues, even the need to “grow the strength of the board” by having other members serve as chair. The chair responded: “We like things the way they are!” The board went along with the chair’s claims, never asserting an independent voice until the long-time chair finally left board service.

This board’s situation falls into the category of passive boards that are willing to contract out their governing responsibilities, in this case to the board chair. In many other cases, the board contracts out governance responsibilities to the superintendent. In either case, the board has abdicated its collective responsibility.

If they are to be meaningful and self-enforced, criteria for the board’s expectations of itself should be established by board vote, not arbitrarily received from others. Still, some well-advised characteristics include having a mindset that focuses on student outcomes rather than the many distractions that come from adult interests, documenting the community’s vision and values, and rigorously conducting a monitoring process that ensures expectations about that vision and those values are measured and reported.

A policy that guides the board’s governance function sets criteria for its board that can be used to monitor and improve its performance. Santa Barbara SD commits to do this as follows:

The Governing Board shall annually conduct a self-evaluation in order to demonstrate accountability to the community and ensure that district governance effectively supports student achievement and the attainment of the district’s vision and goals.

The evaluation may address any area of Board responsibility, including, but not limited to, Board performance in relation to vision setting, curriculum, personnel, finance, policy development, collective bargaining, community relations, and advocacy. The evaluation may also address objectives related to Board meeting operations, relationships among Board members, relationship with the Superintendent, understanding of Board and Superintendent roles and responsibilities, communication skills, or other governance or boardsmanship skills.…2

The effective board is knowledgeable about research-supported and experience-informed board performance measures that can be used as a model to judge its own success in the governance role. It sets criteria in writing by which to self-assess board performance. Significantly, written criteria that are publicly available can also be used by observers to hold the board accountable for its performance. The board requires that self-assessments include data to be collected from multiple sources – self, staff, outside stakeholders, consultants – then publicly reported to the board, compared with criteria, and subsequently discussed by the board. It sets board policy that commits the board to account for its own performance, using previously stated criteria it has developed and documented as a public commitment.

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