Murray Grove Association Board of Trustees Howard Bennett, President Deborah L. Duncan, Vice President Theodore J. Fetter, Treasurer Jean Wiant, Secretary Harold E. Burke Charles Dieterich Shirley B. Giles Frank G. Helman Patricia L. Infante Rev. Kathie Davis Thomas Staff Ellen J. Chulak, Executive Director Michael Masters, Assistant Director Carolyn Maher, Administrator Kenneth Weippert, Maintenance Madeline Lyon, Housekeeping Raymond McElvaney, Special Projects Murray Grove Association P.O. Box 246 Lanoka Harbor, New Jersey 08734 Phone: 609 693 5558 Fax: 609 693 4448 murraygrove@aol.com www.murraygrove.org

From the President Boards are strange animals. While they meet infrequently, quarterly in the case of the Murray Grove board, they often act as if they know better than the people dealing with the problems day to day. While this assumption seems ridiculous, that has never stopped boards from acting this way. Review your personal experience with boards. About a quarter of a century ago John and Miriam Carver recognized the problem and decided to do something about it. They invented a system called Policy Governance. Policy Governance says that governing boards should not be making decisions, but should be creating policies to guide decisions. Why are boards bad at decision making? There are more things to decide than trustees have time or energy for and a board can lose focus on the overall mission. Board meddling disempowers those who know best and care most. Boards are neither close enough to the action nor do they meet frequently enough to be responsive to pressing matters. Membership turnover makes boards unsuitable to directly manage long-term projects. Policy Governance delegates as much decision making as possible and focuses on the vision and identity of the organization. Murray Grove is moving toward Policy Governance. When we complete the transition our board will: Make and change policy. Monitor performance against policy and mission objectives. Allocate and adjust resources, especially budget and permanent staff positions to improve that performance. Make public witness on behalf of MG between meetings by taking public policy stands consistent with our mission. Being a trustee is a spiritual discipline of letting go of the temptation to meddle and recognizing when you are crossing the line. Presented with a problem, it behooves us to decide if a policy exists and, if one does not, to create one. We may need to interpret unclear policies and rewrite them. Policy Governance offers the trustees the prospect of making a lasting difference. In future newsletters, I will advise you on our progress in policy governance and how you, our constituency, will benefit from this change. Howard Bennett