[CSL board] ACTION READ 20 min assessment report

Fri May 2 12:15:30 EDT 2008

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: RE: QUICK FYI assessment report results
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 11:57:05 -0400
From: Jodi DeLibertis <jdelibertis at jerichoroadproject.org>
To: 'Dan MacNeil' <dan at thecsl.org>,	<board at thecsl.org>,	'Becky 
Johnson' <rjohnson at jerichoroadproject.org>,	'Eric Bryant' 
<ebryant at thecsl.org>

Dear CSL Board:

Attached please find the results from the CSL organizational 
capacity assessment I conducted with selected board members last 
month.  You will also find a brief report interpreting the 
results.  As per Dan's email, you will be discussing the results 
of the assessment and implications for the future at the 5/8 
board meeting.

Please spend some time before the meeting reviewing the attached.

I am sorry that I won't be able to join you in person at the 
meeting.  I will be join you via speaker phone for the portion of 
the meeting dedicated to discussing the assessment.  Please feel 
free to email me any questions you have in advance of the meeting 
and I can either answers them via email or in our conversation 
next Thursday.

Best,
Jodi

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan MacNeil [mailto:dan at thecsl.org]
Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2008 6:34 PM
To: board at thecsl.org; Jodi DeLibertis; Becky Johnson; Eric Bryant
Subject: QUICK FYI assessment report results

We (Melissa, Karen, Mimi, Charlotte & I) just finished an 
organizational
self assessment with Jericho Road. (Jodi & Becky). An assessment 
is a  good idea on it's own, but it is an especially good idea 
when a potential major funder (Phil Hall / Parker Foundation) 
suggests it.

Email with a copy of the report. (reading it is a 15 minute 
project)  will follow.

Jodi from Jericho Road will be at our May 8th board meeting to 
discuss the assessment and possible next steps.

I was quite surprised that we did well on:

LEADERSHIP:
    capacity of organizational leaders
    to inspire prioritize, make decisions,
    provide directions and innovate.

On a 1-4 scale with "4" being "people write books about how great 
you  are", we give ourselves a "3". Vision was particularly 
strong (we have one)

We were slightly better than "adequate" on:

ADAPTIVE CAPACITY:
    capacity of a nonprofit to monitor
    assess and respond to internal and
    external changes.

Both Jodi & Becky observed that Leadership and adaptive capacity 
  were the two hardest areas to get right and the hardest areas 
to improve.

QUICK PROBLEMS

In terms of problems with Management and Operational capacity, 
The quick ones to fix are:

	Job Descriptions (self explanatory)

	Lack of shared understanding on insurance, liability and risk.

The state of our insurance/liability/risk is at:

	http://thecsl.org/go/board/#liability

...which everyone (should have) read before coming on the board.

To clarify. We don't have liability insurance, director's 
insurance or workman's compensation insurance. If a volunteer, 
staff person or contractor electrocutes themselves, their 
widow(er) could sue the organization and each individual board 
member.  While such a suit would probably not succeed legal fees 
would painful.

On the other hand the chances of something like this happening 
are pretty low.

If the board feels the current risks are too high, we should 
discuss this and/or get insurance.

BIGGER PROBLEMS

This is quick and subjective. Read the report for things I'm 
skipping.

My top 4 issues are:

	1) Everything falls apart w/o me
	2) We don't do evaluation or Performance Measurement
	3) Funding Model (we have little money)
	4) Communications Strategy

There are other issues but they fall out of the ones above. For 
example  we do poor "HR planning" because we have no money. We 
"hire" based on available volunteer/VISTA talent instead of to 
fill our needs.

POSSIBLE NEXT STEPS (with Jericho Road)

Again, quick subjective, again take 15 minutes to see what 
important stuff, I've omitted. Here is some stuff Jericho could 
help with:

	1) Business Plan
	2) Board Assessment
	3) Communications Planing
	4) Strategic Plan(ing)

Generally I favor doing quick easy things first and doing things 
one at a time.

A business plan is (according to wikipedia):

     A formal statement of a set of
     business goals, the reasons why
     they are believed attainable,
     and the plan for reaching those
     goals.

Having one will:

   * Make funders with strong potential
    (Parker) happier

    * Help with problems 1-3 above.

Additionally:

   * We can get this done relatively quickly

   * This is something Jericho is experienced with.

   * Expanding mvhub & mvhub funding is very plannable

A board assessment will help with probably #1 and given we all 
like to know more about ourselves is probably pretty doable. 
Problem #1

Communications planning, I have a vague ill-defined uneasy 
feeling about.

Strategic planning is time consuming and something we've failed 
at repeatedly.

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