By NEO Law Group
An engaged board can be one of the most important organizational assets of a nonprofit. But nonprofit boards are often underutilized and are not always effective in significantly advancing an organization’s mission. Educating boards and executives about their legal duties, practical steps to take to effectively meet those duties, and best practices in mitigating exposure to organizational and personal liability/harm is key to establishing board engagement and effectiveness.
I spoke with host Tony Martignetti on his Nonprofit Radio podcast about building your best better board. Our discussion stemmed from a blog post I wrote on Setting Up an Effective Nonprofit Board, though we focused on existing nonprofits rather than startups. Board roles – Financial oversight is of course important but...
Nonprofit founders and executives rely upon the corporation’s directors (board members) to set the tone and example for the corporation’s operations, vision, and values. Without an effective and supportive board, corporations can become overly reliant on a single leader, which limits how far the corporation can go in advancing...
Lucy Bernholz, Director of the Digital Civil Society Lab at Stanford University’s Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society, is the expert you need to listen to on matters of digital technology, the nonprofit sector and broader civil society, and democracy. I was fortunate enough to attend two of her...
A board of directors is the ultimate authority of a nonprofit corporation, but that doesn’t mean any individual director (board member) holds such authority or really any inherent authority over the corporation, subject to some very limited exceptions. The following lists of board member rights and non-rights are based...
Earlier this week, I had the privilege of guest lecturing for Professor Louise Carroll‘s Nonprofit Strategic Governance class at the University of San Francisco. As a former graduate and adjunct faculty member of the Master of Nonprofit Administration (MNA) program, which may have been the first in the country,...
Charitable nonprofits are organized and operated to further their tax-exempt missions. For some nonprofits, their mission statement is memorialized in their articles of incorporation and/or bylaws. For others, the mission statement can only be found on their public communications (e.g., website), fundraising materials, and annual information returns (Forms 990)....
Thanks to Jen Bokoff for permitting us to republish this post originally published on the Jeneralist blog. 13 lists of ways to learn and show up as antiracist* in this world *Let’s start with the term “antiracist,” since I know this term alone causes many to go on the...
There are many ways in which two or more nonprofits can collaborate (see La Piana Consulting’s Collaborative Map), including (1) mergers and (2) dissolutions and asset transfers discussed in Part 1 of this series. This post specifically examines a merger between two California nonprofit corporations. Prior to moving forward...
Earlier this month, the California Office of the Attorney General (“AG”) published Charity Governance During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Here are some excerpted highlights from the publication applicable to California nonprofit corporations with some comments: Emergency Provisions Unless prohibited by the nonprofit’s emergency bylaws, the following actions can be taken...
On Tuesday, April 28, at 9 am PDT / 12 pm EDT, I’ll be on Facebook Live with Nadya K. Shmavonian (Partner, SeaChange Capital Partners.) and host Andy Davis (Associate Vice President of Member Education & Outreach, BoardSource) to discuss dissolution and mergers of nonprofits resulting the COVID-19 crisis. We’ll be...