Intentional Founding Board Recruitment
The idea to start a children’s museum often begins with one visionary dreamer who quickly brings in some close friends who also understand that a children’s museum is exactly what their community needs. When these friends say out loud to each other “we need a children’s museum,” their level of excitement quickly attracts more friends and close associates, forming a tight-knit group of founders. The energy of this initial excitement serves as the rocket fuel needed to “achieve lift-off” on the long journey to starting a children’s museum.
Sometimes the cold hard reality of seemingly insurmountable challenges and roadblocks sets in early, and the energy behind the initial excitement fizzles. The founders leave the children’s museum dream behind and move on with their lives.
A more common story is that the founders sustain their initial energy to file the 501(c)3 non-profit corporation status and begin regular meetings as a growing board of directors, conduct a market analysis and feasibility study, draft a master plan with foundational language, secure a site and bring in funding, commission exhibit fulfillment, hire staff, and finally open their dream museum to the joy and delight of a grateful community.
The founders came together because they saw the needs of children and families in their community and the opportunities a children’s museum would bring. The founding group was made up of these particular individuals because they shared a vision and, just as importantly, were already friends or associates. The organic relationships typical of founding board members can be a necessary adhesive for making it through the challenging first steps of the start-up process.
These close connections, however, often have a limiting effect. If all or most of the founders are in the same social group, they likely share similar socio-economic levels, education levels, standards of living, and similar lived experiences moving through the world. For a founding board of directors to achieve a children’s museum that lives up to the unlimited potential of children, its members need to bring a broad range of perspectives and lived experiences representing the diversity of the community it intends to serve, the specific areas of expertise useful in the start-up process, and the interpersonal and leadership skills needed to work together to galvanize the entire community.
A major part of my work as a museum planner is to help early-stage founders find their way through the emerging museum process. I often get questions about board governance and engagement: in particular, “what can I do to make our board of directors more effective?” This persistent question will likely stay with a children’s museum through all stages of its lifecycle because it’s difficult for any mission-driven organization to be its “best self” unless its board of directors has what it takes to lead the way. It’s a big job.
While it’s common (and in many ways helpful) to start with a close-knit group of founders, it’s important to quickly broaden the leadership circle with strategic intention. If you don’t, your children’s museum runs the risk of meeting the needs of your founders but not meeting the needs of the diversity of children and families that make up your entire community. Your start-up may lack the full range of expertise to set up the organization for successful operations long into the future.
That is why I help founders strategically organize their board member recruitment in three main categories: representation of their audience and community, expertise to support the starting-up process, and interpersonal and leadership skills for motivating others and for working collaboratively. We start by auditing the current founding board members and taking a good close look at what they bring in support of all three categories. We comprehensively list all needs that the start-up will encounter through opening and initial operations, organized and prioritized in the three categories. Then we start ideating specific attributes and qualities the board will focus on in recruitment moving forward. The list of attributes and qualities for new board member recruitment can look like:
Representation (of your audience & community):
Socio-economic
Geographic
Demographics
Lived experiences
Industry
Networks
Expertise (in supporting the starting-up process):
Early childhood
Finance
Legal
Technology
Organizational management
Board governance
Interpersonal & Leadership Skills (for motivating others and working collaboratively):
Emotional intelligence
Communications skills
Position & connections
Resilience & grit
Passion
Your list should be more specific to your start-up’s needs, and it’s an important practice to regularly refine the list as your organization grows and evolves. From here, founders can start collecting names of board member prospects and detailing their specific qualities and attributes that match recruitment priorities. When I work with start-ups on this aspect of board development, we always create a working document for organizing the list of priority attributes and skills, matched to names of board member prospects. You can quickly see who to prioritize as your next recruit.
Like most aspects of starting up a new organization, strategically intentional board recruitment is a process that takes practice and discipline. As founders, it’s important to commit time and focus to board recruitment so that your organization builds the muscle memory to carry the practice into the future. As someone who has been through the start-up process a few times, I’m pretty sure your future-self will thank you for starting the practice of intentional board recruitment now.
