A wonderful quote from Mother Teresa saying that “charity isn't about pity it is actually about love”.
When we think about the broader context of the word love, other feelings come to mind like commitment, as well as respect, empathy, perseverance and honesty.
When we think about how we might apply some of those to our role as non profit chair we can think about “commitment” in terms of making sure you are committed to the role as Chair and that the board is actually committed as well, helping people to commit to their roles and what they need to do a good job.
To do that we have respect for the board members their opinions and the senior leadership team in the organization and that we do have real empathy for our beneficiaries, whether it's the environment the animal kingdom or the human condition in all of our endeavors putting ourselves in their shoes
We do have perseverance and resilience as it can be a tough role being a non profit chair but making sure that we do focus on key tasks as it probably takes up some of your extra time but is really is worth it.
Being honest making sure that you're honest with yourself on your role, skills and strengths. Opening up to your board to garner support and communicate what can be achieved by sharing your vision about what you want the board and/or the organisation to be like in the future.
Find out here how you can improve your Chair skills and effectiveness by becoming a Facilitative Chair.