Establishing Accountability on a Volunteer or Non-Profit Board: Topgrading can help

For the past 2 years I’ve been fortunate to be involved with something called the Accelerator Program.  Established by the Entrepreneurs Organization, the Accelerator Program was built around educational content focused on four key issues faced by first-stage entrepreneurs: strategic planning, sales & marketing, people and finance.  Unlike Business Schools or Government Programs, the Accelerator Participants learn from actual Entrepreneurs who are running their organizations day to day and have businesses that are over $1mm in Revenue (less than 4% of companies in the US ever attain this level).

In July, my role as the CHAMPION for Central Texas (essential the Chairman of the Program here in Austin) expires.  My Champion-Elect, Jeffrey Stukuls, will take over.  I’ve been working hard on a transition plan and wanted to be sure that I had:

1. Chosen the right person for the position
2. Assessed them on the skill sets and competencies needed to be successful
3. Clearly set expectations so that they knew both (a) what success meant and (b) what was expected of them

As I was going through all of this I had one of those light bulb moments of clarity.  I thought, “Why not create a Top Accountabilities document like we do for our clients here at Hire Better?”  In case your not familiar, the Top Accountabilities idea was established by Dr. Brad Smart in his book Topgrading.

It’s funny that this kind of idea never struck me as being a solution before but when you really think about it, when have you ever gotten something as simple as a Job Description for a Volunteer role that you had?

Because this blog post wouldn’t have that much meaning unless I showed it to you, I asked Jeffrey if he would mind if I published the document.  Hope you enjoy it!  Click HERE and it will open in a new window.

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