The Community Covenant

Whenever I can, I love to steal someone's self-created vernacular. Actually, I want to give attribution where appropriate, but when someone says something brilliant I want to learn from it. And thus, the lesson today.

I was on a call with a client dealing with how to engage both the governance and foundation boards with some major initiatives when the client said two words that struck me.

“Community Covenant” 

The issue for my client is creating the proper level of engagement and understanding to create an impetus for community members to want to engage in the need... both strategically and tactically. The concern is that the project of need isn't that “sexy” and may not be of interest as much as necessary to both boards, chalked full of community leaders. And that's when he said the words. Community covenant.

I stopped and told him I thought that was a brilliant concept. And it reflects well on what we want in the nonprofit world. At the end of the day, the board is the representation of ownership of our nonprofits. The community owns the nonprofits. And while some nonprofits are larger with lots of executives and leaders, they aren't the owners. Being able to explain the value of the project, and maybe more importantly what would happen if it wasn't completed, led us, based on the concept of a community covenant, to realize the importance of articulating the specific need. And that without it being completed, it could be cataclysmic down the road for not only the nonprofit but for the community as a whole.

As the needs of our communities continue to grow, and the engagement with philanthropy also grows in tandem with these needs, the honesty and openness at which we have with our boards to create that community covenant is critical. If we try to shy away from being open and honest about what we're seeing and the potential challenges that come, a reduced community covenant isn't actually the fault of the community but those of us in leadership who don't communicate as well as we should regarding any issue. If we don't give the community leaders the details and the vision that's necessary, how can they create an appropriate covenant representing the community?

There's so much depth to the concept. But the key to all of it is helping our boards understand their own, representing the larger community, the nonprofit. And with ownership comes responsibility.  Only when we are open, honest, and strategic can we help them create and fulfill that community covenant.