By ANN RICHARDS
Born in England, BoardSource President and CEO Linda Crompton moved with her family to Kenya when she was 13. The contrast between her comfortable, middle-class existence in Nairobi and life in the shantytowns outside the city forever changed her understanding of the world. "I spent many years trying to make sense of it," she said of inequities she witnessed. "The experience changed my mindset; it changed the way I thought then and think now." Throughout her career, Crompton has worked "on both sides of the table" as a board member and director of corporate and nonprofit organizations in healthcare, academia, the arts and banking. In 1996, she founded Citizens Bank of Canada, the country's first online bank with a brand based on social responsibility. Crompton believes there are enormous changes in store for the boards of both for-profit and nonprofit boards, presenting an energizing and exciting challenge for BoardSource, established in 1988 to provide programs and services on governance issues for nonprofit organizations. She received her MBA from Great Britain's University of Kent at Canterbury, a Master's degree from the University of British Columbia and an undergraduate degree from Simon Fraser University, also in British Columbia. Mott Foundation communications officer Ann Richards interviewed Crompton in Flint, Michigan, where she gave the keynote address at a Nonprofit Governance Summit, co-presented by BoardSource and BEST, a Flint-based collaborative utilizing a pool of local consultants to improve the sustainability and effectiveness of the county's nonprofit organizations. [NOTE: This is the second of two articles on the training and leadership needs of small- and medium-sized nonprofits. The first article is a companion story on a new partnership between BoardSource and BEST, a local nonprofit capacity building collaboration in Flint, Michigan.]
Mott: BoardSource has agreed to partner with Flint-area nonprofits -- most of which are small- to medium-sized -- to build nonprofit board capacity in a specific locale. What do you hope to accomplish?
Crompton: We hope this project will end up becoming a model for us, particularly as related to our desire to regionalize services. It's an opportunity to go deep in one community and gain some insights about what training strategies result in successful skill-building for community boards facing a set of identified social problems. This particular project was put in motion before I became CEO of BoardSource, but I'm very supportive of this partnership with BEST. The Flint area nonprofit community is facing extremely tough social conditions with fewer financial resources. There are lessons to be learned here that will inform and refine our training in other communities.
Mott: You've spent most of your career with a foot in both the corporate and nonprofit worlds. What lessons have you taken from these experiences?
Crompton: I've been interested in that nexus at which for-profits and nonprofits come together -- dating back to my MBA thesis, where I examined the conflicts between the sectors. I believe we're beginning to see a hybridization of the two. Before the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, for-profit and nonprofit were considered separate silos. For the most part, corporations were completely unapologetic about their directive to make money and nonprofits didn't want to talk about money at all. But societal expectations have chipped away at the wall between the sectors. Public opinion has forced businesses and corporations to begin addressing the costs of pursuing a profit -- and to consider a different sort of bottom line. Nonprofits have come under closer scrutiny as well. It's no longer acceptable for them to claim they are acting on behalf of the public or spend federal or private dollars without showing some tangible results. More attention is being focused on the use of federal and donor funds. As that wall disappears, more hybrid organizations embodying the best of both -- fiscal responsibility driven by a social mission -- are beginning to appear. What I bring to BoardSource is a cross cultural perspective -- I've served as a CEO and as a board chair, and head of finance and audit committees, in both the for-profit and nonprofit sectors. I believe good governance is more than compliance; it's also about delivering tangible results.
Mott: How does this merging of for-profit and nonprofit accountability standards affect the work of BoardSource?
I believe the next stage of board and governance evolution will focus on organizational and institutional intent -- a stepping back to determine what the organization is trying to do and why. It's a tremendous opportunity for boards to rethink the relationships between for-profit, nonprofit and those they serve. When you consider the societal change that is occurring, the new generation of leadership that is emerging, and the demand for greater accountability, we're presented with a great opportunity to create governance training for new organizational models. It's very energizing.
Mott: How do you anticipate that BoardSource will evolve under your leadership?
Crompton: When I joined BoardSource in 2007, there was a strategic plan in place through 2009. All targets have been reached, so it’s a good time to step back and contemplate what we are doing before moving forward with our next strategic plan. We need to grow and evolve as an organization if we are to continue to be effective in assisting other organizations and their boards. We have to develop methods and tools to stimulate and structure creative thinking about the impact nonprofits, ways to harness all the creative energy of board members that drives problem solving. Right now, we can't keep up with demand for our services, so we're going to have to produce more publications and training opportunities. In order to deliver these services and keep them relevant, we need to focus on research -- I'd like to create a discrete knowledge institute that can formalize all these ethereal ideas. Then we have a responsibility to consolidate and deliver what we've learned, and expand our capacity by regionalizing our services.
Mott: What prompted you to take on the leadership of BoardSource?
Crompton: I believe very strongly in its mission: to strengthen and support boards of nonprofits. The reputation and history -- its branding if you will -- also attracted me. BoardSource rarely advertises, yet clients continuously seek it out. With the number of changes sweeping through corporate and nonprofit boardrooms and the management training needs that will emerge, this is an exciting and challenging time for the nonprofit field and for BoardSource.
Mott: Any final thoughts about the future of nonprofit governance?
Crompton: I think as we look to the future, we are coming to grips with the fact that there are too many nonprofits, too much duplication. The sector is facing a shakedown -- and nonprofit boards need to become more rigorous about outcomes if the public and government are to recognize its value. We need to focus on helping boards develop ways of measuring change that will build support for their organizations -- build an understanding of the costs involved in resolving social ills.