It's President's Day in the US so it feels right to take a moment and reflect on nonprofit board presidents.
Early last year 192 folks responded to my invitation to participate in a survey titled "Do Titles Matter". My interest in titles was stimulated by a paper that was presented at the University of Kansas Missouri bi-annual conference on nonprofit governance. The paper was focused on identifying an understanding of the work of Board Chairs versus Executives. One item that caught my attention in the paper was the relative interchangeable use of the term president when referring to the volunteer and paid leaders of a nonprofit.
My survey revealed that 43% of respondents used the title of President to refer to their volunteer (board) leader while 38% used the title of Chair. The remaining respondents used the term chairman or chairperson title. Interestingly, another 9% used the title President and another 9% used the title President/CEO for their paid leader.
So what is the "so what" of titles like Chair and President? To me it's about expectations. Individuals who hold the title "president", be they the paid or volunteer leader of an organization or even a country, expect to have a set of specific rights and obligations. For instance, people with the title of president often expect to have authority over a number of decision-making areas. When the president is the equivalent of a board chair, expected authority may not be as wide as if the same titled person was the CEO. Whereas many don't really consider Board Chair and Authority as synonomous.
A more important bottom line: titles in and of themselves do not matter all that much but gaining clarity about rights and obligations, particularly of those in leadership positions, really does matter.
I believe that Boards would be well advised to annually review the lables being used to designate the position of the top paid and unpaid leaders of the organization. Part of this label review should focus on ensuring that rights and obligations are quantified and qualified to subsequently achieve positive outcomes.
Happy President's Day!