Moving Toward Higher Performing, Energized Boards, Committees and Board-Executive Relations

Thursday, May 9 from 1-5 p.m. (please note new class date) in # 402 J.C. Penney Conference Center (on the UMSL north campus)

Do you want to strengthen your board and committees’ effectiveness and contribution to organizational success, while forging a more satisfying, effective board-executive relationship?
Do you wish you could organize your board, executive, and staff responsibilities and relationships to best suit your organization’s size and resources?
Does each of these parties’ roles, work and relations need to change to align with a transition or a changing stage in your organization’s development?
Do you wish board and committee work, for both their members and the staff supporting them, could be more productive and fulfilling?
This workshop is designed for staff executives, board leaders and members, or people aspiring to such roles who want to find answers to these questions.  To enable them to successfully address these questions , participants will take away a practical framework, methods, and tools that the workshop leader has created and are utilized nationally by board development trainers and consultants. It will be a participatory learning experience, mixing exercises, small and full group discussion, presentations, and panel discussion.
The workshop will be led by John McClusky, PhD., who has worked with several hundred boards and executives across all mission domains (arts and culture, health, social services, education, community development, religion, civic leadership, etc.) and sizes (from United Way of America to all volunteer community organizations). Board-executive development programs he has designed or co-designed and directed have received national recognition. He has served on numerous boards regionally and nationally and been a nonprofit executive at both levels.
Additionally, a group of exemplary local nonprofit board and executive leaders will serve as panelists or small group facilitators.
 Workshop Objectives for Participants:

• To understand the roles and responsibilities of your board and chief staff officer (CSO)/executive best suited to achieving a highly effective, satisfying board and CSO relationship
• To learn and practice using methods and tools for strengthening how board, committee, and individual board members can act with greater motivation and productivity
• To learn a variety of perspectives from highly effective, local board and staff leaders about how to achieve these objectives
• To share with peers both challenges and successes in strengthening your board and committee performance and engagement

Instructor John McClusky is a consultant, educator, and author of nonprofit leadership and has worked locally, nationally, and internationally with hundreds of NPOs and thousands of nonprofit leaders. In particular, he has trained and consulted with a vast range of nonprofit organizations on governance and boards, from redesigning United Way of America’s board training program for most of its chapters around the country to small neighborhood organizations across all mission domains ( social services, education, health, arts and culture, community development , the environment, civic and community leadership, etc.). He was the founding director of  academic programs in nonprofit  leadership at two universities, the most recent being  the Nonprofit Management and Leadership Program (NPML) at the University of Missouri-St. Louis from 1993-2008.
John was a nonprofit organization executive for more than 20 years, including program executive at the Danforth Foundation, regional chief executive and national president of the Coro Foundation, vice chancellor for external relations at UM-St. Louis, and academic vice president of The Washington (D.C.) Center, a national higher education institution. Additionally, John has held extensive board leadership roles locally and nationally, including United Way of Greater St. Louis Volunteer Center, Blackburn College, Illinois, St. Patrick Center, St. Louis, Missouri School for the Blind, the St. Louis Nonprofit Services Consortium, and the Nonprofit Academic Centers Council (the international association of academic programs in nonprofit studies).
John acquired his B.A. from Cornell University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of California-Berkeley. He is the recipient of numerous academic and professional awards, and an author of numerous publications on nonprofit organizational leadership, governance, effectiveness and capacity building.