Determining Moral Ownership

Now that we know we’re following the Carver form of policy governance, modifying the system where we feel congregational polity requires it, we’re back to getting our governing documents in order.

As you know, we already have a Governance Document that we are using as a guide this year, but we have always known that as we progress through the year we would find places to modify, tighten, omit, change or add to it.  We decided that the place to start is, well, at the beginning.  And the first question to answer (which seems kind of obvious) is, on whose behalf does the board work? 

Carver makes a very definite distinction between stakeholders and moral owners.  At our last board meeting, we brainstormed a very long list of potential stakeholders.  They included members and friends, of course, but also such entities as past and future Unitarians and Universalists, children in our religious education programs, our mission statement (this is the moral owner that Hotchkiss recommends), all people in the Asheville area who share our mission, people we serve in our social justice programs, etc.  However, the designation of a “moral owner” is something more focused.

Carver notes, “The concept of ‘moral ownership’ isolates the various stakeholders to whom the board owes its primary allegiance.  A board cannot carry out its responsibilities without determining exactly whom the ownership includes and how they can be heard.” (page 17 of Boards that Make a Difference)

Carver again, “The Policy Governance model takes as its starting point the principle that a governing board is accountable for the organization it governs and that it exists on behalf of a larger group of persons who, either legally or morally, own the organization…The principle forces the board to consider and answer the questions, From whom do we obtain our authority? And, To whom are we accountable.  This is no easy task but is a necessary one, and it demands that the board distinguish theoretically between owners and stakeholders, particularly customers.” (pp 17-18 of Reinventing Your Board)

Of course, UU congregations have a mashup of members and “customers,” and we already noticed that Hotchkiss likes to use the mission as the moral owner.  So though the question of “To whom is the board accountable?” seems like it might have an obvious answer, we have been doing quite a bit of work in trying to get phrasing that feels right to us.

Therefore, stay tuned as we work out this most foundational piece of policy governance.

By the way, the UUA is also using Policy Governance and here’s their list of moral owners, which they have modified to be their “sources of authority and accountability” rather than moral owners:

1.  Our member congregations

2.  Current and future generations of Unitarian Universalists

3.  The heritage, traditions, and ideals of Unitarian Universalism

4.  The vision of Beloved Community

5.  The Spirit of life, love, and the holy

Ah Hah!!!!

Well, a lot has happened since I last checked in.  Most importantly, we figured out why were having trouble with our Ends Statements.  Turns out that we were mixing up our governance gurus.

As I originally said, we were following Dan Hotchkiss's ideas about governance as posited in his book, Governance and Ministry.  He basically suggests that church boards, especially those churches governed by congregational polity, move more toward a governance system that has the board dealing more at the policy level, leaving the ministry team to do the actual work.  Hotchkiss is quite vague on how this might actually look in action, though he does suggest that the Board develop a policy book and move the congregation forward through strategic planning processes and short-term goal-setting that he terms "Vision of Ministry."

Alas, Hotchkiss makes no reference to a governance document, or Ends Statements, or Executive Limitations or anything else that we have so carefully instructed the congregation about.  All these ideas come from John and Miriam Carver.  Their first book, published in 1990 (Boards That Make a Difference), lays out these concepts as they target governance in nonprofit organizations.

Churches are nonprofit organizations, but they are different than most because they include ministers who are not CEOs and members who are also the beneficiaries of the nonprofit's work.  That's why Hotchkiss developed his system.

However, as a Board, turns out we like a lot of what the Carvers say.  And, we, perhaps mistakenly at the time, adopted their ideas as we developed our governing document.  But now that we've done that, and we realize what we've done, we prefer to follow Carver.  So, I have added Carvers' books as other reference materials.  All Board members (as of this coming meeting) have copies of the 2006 book, Reinventing Your Board: A Step-by-Step Guide to Implementing Policy Governance by the Carvers and will be working hard to keep us on the policy governance path.

One of the things that the Carvers emphasize for "regular" nonprofits is the strong role of the CEO.  A UU church is NOT the same as "regular" nonprofits so we will all be on the lookout for those places where we need to modify Carver to make sense in our situation.

One thing I'd like to point out is that this is hard work.  Not just for me (though that is also true) but for all of us involved in the governance and operation of the church.  Please be sure to thank your board members and all paid staff for their amazing work on all of this!  (Especially Kay Aler-Maida, Michael Vavrek, Mike Horak, Ed Jenest, Marilyn Martin and Mark Ward.)