When I say that nonprofit boards (or really groups of any kind) can't do "deliberative thought," I'm talking about substantive decisions that are made about nonprofit policy or strategic planning, decisions that will affect the life of the nonprofit strategically and will substantively further the organization's ability to accomplish it mission. Such decisions need a combination of analysis and synthesis to be done well. They need people to be able to engage in the process of what used to be called "the scientific method." But the psycho-dynamics of people in a group prevent this process from taking place.

Let's take two common examples.
First, a decision about board giving levels and making regular and substantive giving a part of the board's life.

Second, a budget-related decision, about whether to invest significant financial and personnel resources in improving the organization's fundraising infrastructure in order to start a major gifts cultivation and solicitation process. These are two very common decisions that boards are called upon to make.

Before we dig in, let's see what "deliberative thought" might entail here. There are four qualities a board needs to be able to do "deliberative thought."

1. We're talking about the ability to deliberate and make decisions about the complex issues involved in either one of these topics. We're talking about the ability to sort out and prioritize those issues that are especially relevant to where the organization wants to go strategically.

2. We're also talking about the ability to decide on the kind of goals and objectives that will need to be accomplished to ensure that either of these decisions result in positive enhancements in the capacity of the nonprofit to function and accomplish its mission as a result of increased fundraising.

3. Another factor that is involved is the ability to delineate a variety of possible alternative strategies, along with sets of tactics to implement each of those strategies.

4. Then the ability to judiciously choose which ones among those strategies the organization is best equipped to carry out, in terms of its resources, its context, its methods of operating.

Now let's dig into our examples:

Example 1: Decision on board Giving: We might expect this would be a rather simple decision to make. Here's what needs to be done.

First, we need to brainstorm the issues involved in board giving. Here's just a few issues that you might find commonly. Most boards are very good at this part of the process.
a. Board members vary in their ability to give
b. Board members vary in their motivation to give
c. Board members vary in their understanding of the organization's need for leadership
d. What is the community's image of this nonprofit and its board? How can this be improved?
e. What are the financial needs of the organization? How can the board members collectively address that need from their own personal/corporate financial resource?
f. What are the consequences of the Board's refusal to take a leadership role in giving?
g. What is the strategic plan of the organization?
h. What is the strategic plan for fundraising for the organization? What needs to be accomplished, and how will it be accomplished and by when?

What needs to happen next is that we need to prioritize these issues relative to their importance in this particular situation. Some may be more relevant and pressing than others. This is typically where boards start to have a hard time.

And then we need to provide detailed answers to the questions posed. When the questions are answered, the answers need to be sorted out in a way that provides a series of alternative strategies from which the Board members will need to choose. Boards are notoriously incapable of doing this step with any kind of consistency.

This is a complicated process, the process of deliberative thought. It's really akin to the scientific method – yes, that "scientific method." The one we learned in school, in chemistry or physics class. You know, form the hypothesis, test the hypothesis, evaluate the results, come to some tentative conclusions with a new hypothesis, then go ahead and test that hypothesis.

It's clearly beyond the ability of most groups of people, including nonprofit boards, to do this by working together. But we frequently demand that they do this even though most Board members are not equipped to carry this out, and are not psychologically prepared or capable of doing it. They can work individually; they can work with one other person. But the psycho-dynamics are too overwhelming to allow these steps to be done by a group.

And, still, that's not all that's involved. Once a set of giving strategies is developed, the board must put these strategies in place, implement them, evaluate the results they're getting at regular intervals, and then make any mid-course corrections that might be needed depending on what the evaluations show.

This is not only detailed work, but a time-consuming and longer-term process. It takes some concentration, commitment, open-mindedness and a lot of patience with the details in order to be done correctly and in a way that will bring a positive result to the organization.

Not only that, but wouldn't it be good if the decision could be based on full consensus by the board? But that would mean all viewpoints have been voiced, heard, taken into account and everyone fully included throughout the process. This would promote a strong sense of ownership and "buy-in" for all the Board members.

So it's a pretty complicated process, but it can bring about a solid decision that has positive results. But the psycho-dynamics of a board's working together make it nearly impossible for a board to make such a decision in this way, using deliberative thought. So what generally happens?

One of two things generally happens with such a decision-making process: either the Executive Director of the nonprofit will have the perspicacity to have his/her staff do most of the deliberative work and bring alternatives back to the Board.

Or, what happens all too frequently, the Executive just bulls on ahead, gives the board the decision, let's them go at it in helter-skelter style without any expertise or guidance, and try to emerge with some kind of giving process that most of the board can tolerate. And in the process the organization may well lose some good leadership as the more disgruntled board members, who feel their concerns were not heard, simply give up and resign. Pain all around.

Pain because the decision is flawed to start with, which makes it difficult to carry out; pain because some people are left out or passed over; pain because the ability of the Board to lead has been hampered rather than strengthened by the decision-making process; pain because the staff will have to implement the Board giving program and yet have had no substantive, deliberative input.

Why? Because the board was given a task that, essentially, they are not prepared or qualified to do – they were asked to do deliberative thought, when what they really do best is brainstorming and telling stories. One of the problems involved is that most groups of people today enter into any discussion or problem-solving situations prepared to DEBATE rather than enter into DIALOGUE. Debate is a win/lose proposition -- I amass enough details and points of view on my side so I win and you have to lose. But dialogue is a win/win situation. Here are some of the ingredients of a dialogue:

1. The group does a discovery process to elicit all the facts.
2. We work at setting out alternatives that meet the needs of all vested interests in the question.
3. We all take responsibility for choosing among those alternatives the strategies that we think will best meet all those needs.
4. And, in the end, we all win.
5. Dialogue is tougher than debate because to enter into dialogue we must suspend judgment.
6. We also must reveal our assumptions, both hidden and overt.
7. In dialogue we must be able to mentally entertain diverse perspectives through a process of empathetic listening.
8. Dialogue also involves a complete and frank sharing of information and asks each player to seek out shared values that move us toward collaborative action.

Before I suggest what should be done in this example of the board decision about making a significant board contribution to this nonprofit – a better way to make such a complicated decision – let's go on to example #2. We'll find further insights there.