Why we’re doubling our efforts on board diversity 

Trustees Week, which took place earlier this month, provides an opportunity to celebrate the contributions of thousands of volunteers, including my fellow NPC trustees, who willingly give up their valuable time to play a vital role on charity boards.

And it’s a time when trustees are rightly being called upon to double down on efforts to increase board diversity.

It also coincides with us recruiting for new trustees at NPC.    

Strategic alignment 

As Chair of NPC I believe that diversity, equity and inclusion is central to NPC’s mission to strengthen and grow the impact economy. Specifically, NPC can and should be part of a movement to make the sector more diverse, inclusive, and equitable, working with other organisations with greater knowledge and lived experience of marginalisation.   

NPC itself needs to become even more diverse, inclusive, and equitable. Not only because we can only be part of the solution if we attract and retain diverse talent, but also because diversity, equity and inclusion matters to us in and of itself.

Trustees must lead by example. This means we have clear plan with measurable goals against which progress is monitored at every board meeting. Also, it means we seek to role model best practice behaviour.

One way we are doing this is re-looking at our Board to bring in new skills and diversity as we broaden our focus to the impact economy.

Leading by example

So how are we seeking role model best practice in this trustee recruitment round?

Helpfully the Charity Commission recently updated its guidance, emphasising inclusive, skills-based, and transparent trustee recruitment. 

Using this as our base, thus far we have completed the following steps:

1. Conducted a skills audit to identify gaps in skills, knowledge, and diversity. 

This is something we do regularly as a board because, in a small group, one or two changes in people can have a big impact.  

From this we learned we have:

• Good representation across target demographic groups, including the two priority areas identified in our DEI improvement plan – ethnicity and class – although we cannot be complacent.  Specifically, 40% of our trustees are from a non-white ethnic background and 20% of our trustees are from a working-class background.
• Depth and breadth in core leadership and governance skills (strategy, governance, finance, communications, etc.). IT strategy & systems development, including cyber security, is the area where we have the least collective experience although we do have the option to buy-in additional expertise as and when needed. 

An opportunity to build on our existing knowledge in areas relevant to NPC’s work. Specifically, we are particularly interested in hearing from individuals with experience in (a) philanthropy, family offices, wealth management or wealth advisory; and/or (b) working in a large charity or foundation.

2. Updated our trustee role description
This is not only to reflect recent changes in the organisation but also to define responsibilities, expectations, and time commitments; and to avoid jargon, hopefully tailoring our language to attract a wider pool of candidates.

3. Sought specialist support
We’ve appointed Green Park to help us broaden our reach beyond our existing networks and to leverage their expertise and experience to help us reduce unconscious bias and ensure a fair selection process. We’re excited to see where this process takes us and what we learn along the way.