Serving on a nonprofit board has many challenges for the unseasoned board member. One of these challenges I beleive is getting to know who exactly everyone is. Now you might think that in a board with only 9 people, this shouldn't be so hard but what about a board with 12 or 15 or even 21?
A customer of mine, and one who was pretty seasoned but new to this particular board, was reflecting on her lack of familiarity with who exactly were the other members. Her board only meets every other month, and yes, they had an orientation but really, how exactly is she supposed to remember everyone?
So, here are two ideas:
First, what about a playbill? Yup, just like in the theatre or sports event. A little booklet with the names of each member, a picture and some specs (e.g. graduate of x place, business person or some other professional, maybe a hobby, and maybe some expressions of what the member is passionate pertinant to the nonprofit.
Second, I see this regularly but mostly by really big nonprofits -- name "tents" which have the name of every member to be picked-up at the beginning of the meeting and placed in front of the member.
Have you any ideas about how to help board members recognize their fellow board members? Please share.