Governance & board development
Governance framework review and strengthening for nonprofits
Your governance has grown organically and is now unclear — nobody is quite sure who decides what, and accountability lines are blurred.
What you'll achieve
A well-defined governance framework with clear roles, accountability lines, and decision-making processes that give your board and staff confidence.
How a Nonprofit Builder consultant helps
- Review your governing documents, committee structures, and current practices, benchmark against good governance standards, and recommend and implement improvements.
Key deliverables
- Governance review report, updated governing documents, roles and responsibilities matrix, decision-making framework, board briefing session.
Related projects
More from Governance & board development
Board effectiveness assessment & development
“Your board meetings feel procedural rather than strategic — trustees are disengaged, contributions are uneven, and the board is not adding the value it should.”See project
Board recruitment & induction support
“You struggle to find trustees with the right skills — and when you do recruit, new board members take far too long to become useful contributors.”See project
Board reporting, data and information
“Your Board feels it does not have the right information to function properly.”See project
Often paired with
Decision-making & accountability framework
“Nobody is clear on who has authority to decide what — everything escalates upward, progress stalls, and staff feel neither empowered nor accountable.”See project
Safeguarding responsibilities for trustees/non-executive directors
“Your trustees or non-executive directors carry safeguarding accountability, but they are unclear on what that means in practice and how to provide proper oversight.”See project
From the resource library
Free tools and guides to get started
- 3.4C039
Good Governance: A Health Check
A board self-assessment tied to the Code of Good Governance (3rd edition) in Northern Ireland. It has 92 questions across 5 principles: understanding the board's role, working as a team, control and risk, integrity, and openness and accountability. Boards rate each item not met, part met or fully met, record evidence against suggested prompts and fill in an action table for each principle with actions, owners and dates.
Start hereCurrentTool or templateFree - 3.1C028
Boards of Directors and Governance Systems
A practical guide to strengthening NGO boards, first written in Spanish for organisations in Latin America, where board development tools adapted to local culture and language were scarce. The English version followed requests from outside the region. It walks through board roles, structures and governance systems in practical steps, with tools that boards and executive directors can apply to their own organisation.
Start hereClassicKey manual or guideFree
All 13 resources on governance and boards All 7 resources on starting a nonprofit