How often has this happened to you: you approach a board member about their willingness to serve as Board Secretary, and their immediate response is, “Oh, thanks for asking, but I’m not a very good note taker.”  Or: “I don’t have the time to prepare the minutes.”   Or, more likely: “Ugh.  Really?  There’s no one else who can take notes?”

As a man of a certain age, I’m cool with the fact that I’m not the target audience of most Tik Tok influencers.  You see how that doesn’t bother me?  Very demure. 

Now, some people would be quite upset to think that a global communication channel has effectively bypassed them.  You see how I’m totally chill with that, though?  Very mindful.

 And not everyone agrees with appropriating a younger generation’s cultural references to exude a faux sense of hipness.  But you see how I did that to lure you into reading this far?  Very cutesy (with apologies to Jools Lebron).  

Things got a bit topsy turvy at the most recent board meeting of the local nonprofit “Do Good, Inc.”:

Board Chair:  “I have good news and bad news.  The bad news is that our beloved, long-time executive director, Pat, is planning to retire later this year.  The good news is that we have a strong internal candidate, Casey, who’s interested in the role.” 

Board Members:  “Thank goodness we have our next leader lined up, right?”  “Hold on, we should do an external search.”  “Isn’t that a waste of time and money?”  “Casey will be a great ED. Are we done now?”  “Casey’s good, but what if there’s a better candidate out there?”  ‘Are you saying we have to do an internal AND external search?” “Won’t we lose Casey if we hire someone else?”  “Let’s make Casey the acting ED and do a search later if they don’t work out.”  “Let’s just ask Pat if we should hire Casey.”  “Will we save money if we hire Casey?  “Isn’t this the Executive Committee’s job?”

Board Chair:  “Oh, great.  Now what?”

Early in my tenure as CEO of Jump IN for Healthy Kids, my colleagues gave me a lovely gift: a handcrafted nameplate for my desk. 

We often use the term, "the Dunleavy Difference" when describing how our team goes above and beyond for our clients. Susannah did just that when she joined staff and board members on October 21st and slept outside her front door.