THE PRACTITIONER’S GUIDE TO GOVERNANCE AS LEADERSHIP
The Practitioner’s Guide to Governance as Leadership offers a resource that shows how to achieve excellence and peak performance in the boardroom by putting into practice the groundbreaking model that was introduced in the book, Governance as Leadership. This proven model of effective governance explores how to attain proficiency in three governance modes or mindsets: fiduciary, strategic, and generative.
Throughout the book, author Cathy Trower offers an understanding of the Governance as Leadership model through a wealth of illustrative examples of high-performing nonprofit boards. She explores the challenges of implementing governance as leadership and suggests ideas for getting started and overcoming barriers to progress. In addition, Trower provides practical guidance for optimizing the practices that will improve organizational performance including: flow (high skill and high purpose), discernment, deliberation, divergent thinking, insight, meaningfulness, consequence to the organization, and integrity. In short, the book is a combination of sophisticated thinking, instructive vignettes, illustrative documents, and practical recommendations.
The book includes concrete strategies that can help improve critical thinking in the boardroom, a board’s overall performance as a team, as well as information for creating a strong governance culture and understanding what is required of an effective CEO and a chairperson. To determine a board’s fitness and help the members move forward, the book contains three types of assessments: board members evaluate each other; individual board member assessments; and an overall team assessment.
This practitioner’s guide is written for nonprofit board members, chief executives, senior staff members, and anyone who wants to reflect on governance, discern how to govern better, and achieve higher performance in the process.
Table of Contents:
List of Exhibits, Figures, and Tables xiii
Foreword xvii
by Richard Chait
Preface xxi
CHAPTER 1: THE GOVERNANCE AS LEADERSHIP MODEL 1
Premises 2
Underlying Assumptions 2
Governance Reform 3
The Three Modes or Mental Maps 4
Why Three Modes? 14
CHAPTER 2: GETTING STARTED AND GAINING TRACTION WITH GOVERNANCE AS LEADERSHIP 21
What Is Optimized at Board Meetings? 22
What Is Different about Generative Governance? 22
Moving to Higher Purpose and Optimizing Performance:
Beginning the Conversation 23
Moving to Higher Purpose and Optimizing Performance: Getting Started 26
Moving to Higher Purpose and Optimizing Performance: Getting Traction 33
CHAPTER 3: ENCOURAGING CRITICAL THINKING IN THE BOARDROOM 47
Critical Thinking and Metacognition 48
Getting on the Balcony 50
Ways of Thinking 51
Impediments to Critical Thinking 54
Cognitive Biases and Board Workarounds 62
Social Loafing 70
Groupthink 71
Avoiding Groupthink and Its Close Cousins 77
CHAPTER 4: TURNING YOUR BOARD INTO A HIGH-PERFORMING TEAM 85
Social Systems 86
Groups and Teams 87
Boards as Teams 89
Effective Board Teams in the Context of Governance as Leadership 91
CHAPTER 5: CREATING A GOVERNANCE-AS-LEADERSHIP CULTURE 125
Culture 126
Three Toxic Cultures 128
Culture Change 131
Culture Conducive to Governance as Leadership 132
Tools to Support a “Governance as Leadership–Friendly” Culture 143
CHAPTER 6: WHAT GOVERNANCE AS LEADERSHIP REQUIRES OF LEADERS 169
Leadership 170
CHAPTER 7: MEASURING AND SUSTAINING GOVERNANCE AS LEADERSHIP 187
Measuring Board Performance 188
Sustaining Governance as Leadership 211
EPILOGUE 215
REFERENCES 217
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 221
THE AUTHOR 227
BOARDSOURCE 229
INDEX 231
About the Author :
CATHY A. TROWER, PhD, is president of Trower & Trower, Inc., a board governance consulting firm founded in 1998. Formerly a senior research associate at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, Cathy is nationally known for her expertise on board policies and best practices, leadership, organizational change, strategic thinking, group dynamics, faculty diversity/workplace satisfaction, and shared governance. She is in high demand as a speaker, consultant, coach, and advisor to boards and executives.
Email: catrower@trowerandtrower.com
Website: www.trowerandtrower.com
