Input Source: Member Survey  (10/15/2011—10/31/2011)

A survey of current board members (5), former board members  (1), management committee representative (1) and  EpCom chair (1), was sent by e-mail October 15. The last response was collected on October 24. All 8 individuals surveyed returned their surveys for 100 percent response.

Click here for the survey questions:

Key Findings:

While all findings of the survey will be reported, just five will be highlighted for concentrated analysis in charts and discussion. These are seen as most relevant to potential training needs, while others help suggest how to approach training.

On these items there was uniform or near agreement:

• Survey question #1: Only one of 8 members thought the board should meet more; no member thought the board should meet less.
• Survey question #3: Is the board size appropriate? Only one member said definitively that the board should be larger; others added to the survey that it would be too difficult to recruit more members. A larger board, said the member “could accomplish more outside of the meeting, and if one or two members are absent, the board would have enough to move forward with decisions.”
• Survey question #4: Does the board follow the written agenda? All members said yes.  Data from the minutes show the board perception can be inaccurate.
• Survey question  #11:  Is the board perceived in a positive manner by the community it serves:  all 8 members agreed that it is; however,  6 of 8 respondents qualified this with statements such as: “no matter how hard the board works on the community’s behalf, there will always be those who criticize it” and “most folks are oblivious to the board.”
• Survey question #12: 7 of 8 members felt they could express their views honestly and fully.

These issues are highlighted for extended discussion, as they generated the most enthusiastic and detailed responses from the board and are most relevant to the recommendations.*
 * apologies for the quality of charts; the project budget did not allow a WordPress upgrade.
 
 LENGTH OF MEETINGS:
 
Figure 1: Are the board meetings generally: 1) too short 2) too long 3) just the right amount of time?
 

Only one member of the board (a voting member) believes that the meetings are the appropriate amount of time. As a follow-up, this member (partially retired) acknowledged, “I like meetings.”  All other members of the board maintain full-time jobs and commute distances as long as 40 miles to their jobs.

The other board member agreed meetings take too long. The follow up question here, “If meetings are running too long, what is the reason?”  drew 0 responses.

 

EFFICIENCY:
 
Figure 2: Does the board use its meeting time efficiently? 1) Yes 2) No
 

This question drew the largest response on open-ended questions on the survey. Answers included:
• Chairperson has to be aggressive in sticking to a timeline.
• Too much social time spent at meetings.
• The meetings are “wine-tastings at which meetings break out.”
• The board continues discussing items even when an impasse has been reached and it is time to take a vote.
• Members must arrive on time, ready to work.
•  Social time of meetings should take place after the meetings.

ACTION:

Figure 3: Does the board usually act on all of its action items during its meetings? 1) Yes
2) No

Why are action items delayed? Members responsed:

• Som members come unprepared.
• The board does not have enough information to act; desires further research for action.
• The management committee representative, or board members, have not followed up on tasks they agreed to undertake.

 TONE OF MEETINGS:
 
Figure 4: Describe the tone of most board meetings. (Choose any/all that apply.)

It is a great asset to this board that members see meetings as orderly, productive (unanimous!), and harmonious.  In individual responses, members praised this as a “congenial” group.  As a later discussion will show, the members’ views on productivity does not match up with an analysis of the board minutes from the last three years.

POTENTIAL CHANGES TO PROCESS

Figure 5: What changes would you like to see in how board meetings are run? Choose any that apply.

 

Important notes:
•  Board members believe they should get the agendas earlier from the board president, and the minutes from the recording secretary.
•  No Robert’s Rules: the board seeks consensus, not votes or rigid restrictions on discussion. One member mistakenly believed they already follow Robert’s.
•  The board must stick to a regular night for the meetings.
•  No need to rotate leadership (although some facilitator’s guides recommend this).

OTHER IMPORTANT FINDINGS FROM OPEN-ENDED QUESTIONS

Members report:

• They enjoy an open exchange of opinions/mutual respect. Members feel comfortable in offering dissenting opinions.
• Members believe committee work outside of meeting times would improve their efficiency during the actual meetings, but they do not have time to engage in it.
• Having better community information would allow the board to do its work better; sharing information with the community would increase an awareness of what the board does and perhaps make its work easier.

Why is it hard to recruit members for the board?
• Many community residents do not want to be involved; why volunteer when they pay a homeowner’s fee?
• For most, the meeting time is all the discretionary time they are willing to allot.
• A big deterrent to attracting new members is the time involved; another is having to deal with people’s issues and problems.
• Apathy, lack of connectedness.
• A perception or concern there will be times when there may be friction between the board member and “a neighbor” due to decisions made or not made.

What would make the board more productive?
• Staff to delegate more projects to. No money to do so.
• Minutes/financials should be distributed ahead of time and not during the meeting.
•Enforce a time limit and try to complete each meeting in two hours or less.

SUMMARY

The board does not wish to meet more or add additional members. There is a strong desire to get the meetings to under two hours and to be sure to have all the information it needs to act promptly.  Even though most members thought the meetings were orderly, there was a concern that meetings drift off topic often, or in the words of one member “get caught up in chit-chat.” While one member mistakenly believed the group followed Robert’s Rules of Order, there is no set way for handling the agenda and there is no desire to enforce a strict process.  The board wishes to keep the meeting convivial so that the harmony demonstrated by this volunteer group

As one member phrased it, “the challenge is to make the board’s work more efficient.” The primary training need is to make the time spent in board meetings more productive so that this sacrifice of personal time is directed to the best use.