Board Governance & Decision-Making
Carver policy governance, RACI for decision rights, and disciplined meeting design.
4.1 The Carver policy governance model
John Carver's Policy Governance model (nonprofit management literature) is the standard framework for distinguishing board-level governance from operational management. Without this distinction, boards micromanage operations while neglecting governance — the most common pathology of nonprofit boards.
| Board's domain (governance) | President's domain (operations) |
|---|---|
| Mission, values, and strategic direction | Subcommittee structure and task assignment |
| Financial limits and risk tolerance | Day-to-day budget management |
| Evaluation of organizational outcomes | Running events, programs, facilities |
| CEO/President accountability | Volunteer coordination and onboarding |
| Policy development | Policy execution |
4.2 Decision rights and RACI
RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed) is the most widely used tool in organizational design for eliminating decision ambiguity. Every recurring process in the league should have a RACI owner assigned within the first 60 days. Unowned processes default to the President — this is the primary cause of executive burnout in small nonprofits.
4.3 Meeting design (best practices)
- Every board meeting agenda item should be: a decision, an update, or a discussion — never all three simultaneously
- Decisions require: a written proposal, an owner, a deadline, and criteria for success
- Default meeting length: 45 minutes. Longer means the problem was not defined clearly enough beforehand
- Assign a rotating "devil's advocate" role to surface dissent before decisions are final