Training and Evaluation

In order for progress to be made and for a nonprofit to succeed in its area of interest, it is becoming increasingly important that boards self evaluate. Boards must establish evaluation measurements from the very beginning and have the support of committee members, directors, and organization employees. The Board of Directors is directly responsible for keeping up with evaluation, in addition to accepting the results as their responsibility

It is very important to note that boards may fall trap to a negative way of thinking. Sometimes evaluation is frowned upon out of fear of the results. Board members may see evaluation as judgment instead of constructive criticism and may be resistant to it. Also, board members should not approach the topic of evaluation with a lack of personal regard. That is, boards should not insinuate that a bad evaluation equals punishment (Robinson 86-87).

Remember that evaluation is about learning and improving. The evaluation process is designed to give everyone in the organization a voice, including those serving on the board. Informal evaluation is constantly occurring because employees of an organization are always forming opinions, both positive and negative. The trick is to formalize the opinion process in a way that is useful to the organization as a whole (89).