Support Mechanisms – What Can Enable Community Management to Work?

9 Support Mechanisms

1. The CEO of the organization is the senior paid professional and has a responsibility to educate the Board about its governance role and to provide support such as helping to develop a governance manual and enabling access to education programs on governance and support in recruiting Board members.
2. As many CEOs in our sector come to that position by default and not because of any particularly management expertise, they too need support and education to perform their role effectively.
3. There may be a need to examine the issue of paid directorships – particularly in areas where it is difficult to recruit Board members.
4. There needs to be resources for organizations that are struggling with governance such as those provided by the NCOSS Management Support Unit.
5. At times this may mean more than a phone line and can include training and mentoring opportunities such as those provided through the ADHC funded NDS Governance program.
6. There needs to be a check on governance health and compliance by the regulatory body – at present generally by ASIC or the NSW Office of Fair Training. This is why the call in the sector for a single regulatory body for the sector – an Office of Charities – with a proper understanding of the demands of governance is so important. Interestingly, in my experience, it is the Office of the Registrar for Indigenous Corporations that provides the best governance support to organizations – rather than ASIC or the NSW Office of Fair Trading. Those organizations at risk of not meeting their governance requirements need to be identified early and offered relevant support. This has to be funded.
7. The cost of effective governance needs to be factored into funding agreements with government departments.
8. In situations where organizations are simply unable to meet their governance requirements, some form of shared service arrangement may be necessary – for example a cluster of services may be governed by a single Board, even if they retain their individual service identities. This may be particularly useful in areas where it is difficult to recruit suitable Board members. Assistance and resources to develop such shared governance arrangements is needed.
9. Mentoring – organizations that have effective governance in place may be willing to mentor other Boards in their area – perhaps in a non-competitive service.

Table of Contents

Related posts:

1. The Problems of Community Management – What Doesn’t Work?
2. The Demands of Community Management
3. The Dark Side of Community Management
4. Pre-Requisites for Effective Community Management – What Works?
5. The Future of Community Management: NGO Perspectives – A Practitioner’s View
6. Benefits of Community Management