Q:

"I’m the ED of a community-based organization. Over the past few years, our Board has done a lot of work to clarify and articulate our values. One of the values we’ve named as central to our organization is being community-oriented, ensuring that we put the wellbeing of people first in everything we do. That includes the people we serve, but also the people inside the organization doing the work. Recently, those values were put to the test.

For the past ten years, we have received almost a quarter of our core operating funding from one source. Staff carefully reviewed the funding requirements and concluded that it wasn’t aligned with our values, because it made it difficult to truly put people first. I agreed, so I brought the recommendation to opt out of the funding to our Board.

Many boards would have pushed back hard on a decision like this because of the financial risk. But our Board listened carefully, asked thoughtful questions, identified potential risks and mitigation strategies, and trusted the staff recommendation. And the decision didn’t ruin us. In fact, it helped us connect with other funders and opportunities that were far more aligned with our values. In the year this decision took effect, we closed the fiscal year with a healthy surplus."

A:

I am cheering so hard for this Board. Here’s what happened: staff came to the Board and said, “You know that funding that makes up about a quarter of our annual budget? We don’t think it’s a good fit for our values.” That’s a tough moment.

Because ultimately, Boards are accountable for an organization’s financial health. And in a really challenging funding landscape, it would have been easy - understandable, even - to say, “Thanks for raising the concern. Let’s take the money and deal with our values once our budget is in the black.”

But they didn’t. They found themselves in a situation where the “practical” thing to do didn’t align with the “right” thing to do - which is an incredibly hard place to be for a group of volunteers carrying fiduciary responsibility - and they chose to do the right thing. They upheld the organization’s core values.

I mean, it’s really easy to say your organization is values-driven. It’s much harder to actually walk the talk. Walking away from a significant funding opportunity, especially in today’s funding climate, takes real courage. And we tend to put a lot of emphasis on risk management in governance. So seeing courageous, values-led decision-making like this? Totally worth celebrating!

What’s also clear to me is that this decision didn’t come out of nowhere. The Board and staff had obviously already done the work to clearly articulate the organization’s values, and had invested in embedding those values into the organization’s culture, governance, and operations. This is an organization where values aren’t just words on a page. They’re shared, understood, and actively used to guide decisions. Staff and Board have a common language for what those values mean, why they matter, and how to live them day to day. I can’t emphasize how valuable (and rare!?) that is in governance spaces.

And what really stands out to me here is that those shared values created the conditions for trust between staff and Board. The Board trusted the assessment staff had made. And staff trusted the Board to make the final call. That kind of mutual trust is exactly what we should be aiming for in nonprofits.

When Boards Let Values Lead the Way

Clearly articulated, shared, and widely understood values are a really significant leverage point in governance. The reality is that boards face tough decisions all the time. Having clear values won’t necessarily make those decisions easier, but it does make the process clearer. And share values can go a long way toward enabling collaborative, trusting board–staff relationships that actually support impact.

Big Takeaways

• Values only matter if they guide hard decisions. It’s easy to call yourself values-driven when things are comfortable. But it takes courage and leadership to walk the talk.
  
  
• Trust is built when Boards take values seriously. Lack of trust between boards and staff is a very common constraint in nonprofit governance. Shared values can do a lot of heavy lifting in building trust between roles.
  
  
• Values-led decisions don’t undermine sustainability. Like any decision, they involve trade-offs, but clear values help Boards navigate tough calls in ways that support long-term sustainability, not just short-term survival.