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Board, Are You Watching a Leadership Time Bomb?
Brian Kreeger • Nov 10, 2021
More importantly, are you a bomb defuser or unknowingly a bomb developer?
My guess is that more board members believe they are the defuser when they are actually unknowingly a bomb developer.
Whoa, Whoa....give me chance to explain.
First, what is the leadership time bomb? The time bomb is the leadership fall that could occur in your organization that will cause your organization to be, at minimum, severely impaired for years to come or, at most, closed down.
Yes, both occurrences happen with regularity and they both are like a bomb going off in the organization and the community. But really, after they happen, can’t we usually look back and see them as a time bomb that was waiting to explode in the board's lap?
This makes an organizational bomb a time bomb. It has been sitting in wait for the most damaging time to explode.
(This blog focuses on starting a conversation centered on preventing the fall of nonprofit leaders. I write it from a Christian perspective, but all leaders will benefit. Be sure to sign up to receive these articles via email every Tuesday at
briankreeger.com as well as taking a look at previous blog articles. In addition to receiving these articles two days before they hit social media, you will receive the article "5 Early Indicators of a Christian Nonprofit Leadership Fall" along with the Contents, Introduction and the Appendix (My story) of my book,
The Courageous Ask: A Proactive Approach to Prevent the Fall of Christian Nonprofit Leaders.)
The potential for a leadership time bomb exists in almost any organization, for-profit or nonprofit. But who do
you want to be in relation to the inevitable time bomb in your organization?
Let’s compare the two roles to see where you might fit.
The unknowing bomb developer
is the typical board member who comes to most meetings, reviews the minutes and financials, helps the board talk through decisions- basically follows traditional board requirements. This board member limits engagement primarily to regularly scheduled meetings, where they may or may not be fully engaged- let’s be honest, how many times can we look around the table to find board members disengaged on their smart phones?
This type of board member sacrifices their time for the organization they are so passionate about, and are very much needed. They have balanced their life in such a way that they can use their time and talents for the benefit of the organization without jeopardizing the other important parts of their life, including family life.
This is the typical board member, carrying out the typical responsibilities communicated to them. They are doing what is expected of them. From their vantage point, all is good.
But, as has been written in many of these articles, devastating leadership falls almost always find a personal issue at the core of their fall. While it is possible that typical board responsibilities may help reveal some indicators of a potential fall, this assumes excellent board engagement.
Proper monitoring of the personal life of a nonprofit leader is not typical of most boards of directors.
And we cannot forget the challenges boards continually face as a body. Personality melding, recruitment, engagement, governance, and board education top the list of board challenges.
What you find in these descriptions is a breeding ground for complacency. This complacency, combined with the natural challenges of the board as a body, can cause a board to lose focus on those things that can be most damaging to their nonprofit. A leadership fall can damage a nonprofit to the level of closing down, and these falls most times come from a personal issue in the life of the nonprofit leader.
Bottom line….the key characteristics of a board member that can make them an unknowing time bomb developer are complacency, and focusing on the functionality of the board. Both assume that the nonprofit leader has things under control in the organization and in their personal life. These assumptions may lead an executive to loneliness and isolation, two of the more prominent reasons for a leadership fall. This lack of monitoring is a time bomb waiting to go off.
Now, let’s take a look at the leadership time bomb defuser.
The bomb defuser has most of the same attributes as the unknowing time bomb developer, but they take their role to another level.
They follow through on their responsibilities as a board member as they are traditionally viewed and described above.
The defuser recognizes time bomb development is almost inevitable in the life of their leader, but they also recognize they can help defuse the bomb before it explodes.
The time bomb defuser acts upon the fact that they are needed because of the inherent struggles that can form stumbling blocks in the leader's life.
They recognize their leader is human and has insecurities and fears that are part of that humanity. The defuser is much more in-tune with the humanity in their leader and takes their engagement with the leader to an appropriate level. This engagement comforts the leader in knowing that the board member is “for them” in more than a job description focused way.
The defuser has the courage to ask questions beyond the job description to ensure the executive is on the right path, the one they were on when hired.
This role sees how hard the leader works to fulfill the mission of the organization with grand passion, and recognizes that in doing so might take it too far. This board member defuses the time bomb by helping to protect the leader from themselves. This is done by helping them to balance their passion for the mission with those things that got them there in the first place, things like family and spiritual disciplines.
This board member also helps protect the executive from unrealistic expectations, and those expectations that may cause the leader to lose their personal identity in favor of a less accurate organizational identity.
Simply, the defuser looks beyond the organization and the job description and sees a person. They see a person who deals with the same struggles the board member does….the sin, the fallibility, the human nature.
Most importantly, the defuser works with the board to change the traditional way boards operate. Along with the legal and more traditional duties of the board, they work to include the duty of looking at the executive more as a person than a job description. They work to move the focus of the board from their own operations and struggles to those things that can propel the organization forward, and protect the organization from those things that can bring them down, including a leadership fall.
So, who do you want to be,
as a board member, in the life of your executive?
Certainly I would encourage you down the defuser path.
Allow me to point out how little time it takes to be a defuser. It takes hardly an hour more, spread out over a month. An encouraging text here, a thoughtful email there. A courageous question here and there.
I promise you, your hour will be well worth it. The defusing of the time bomb might save your organization.
Your executive craves it, they need it.
And just maybe you do too.
Be Courageous!
Be Proactive!
Be sure to sign up to receive these articles via email every Tuesday at
briankreeger.com. In addition to receiving these articles two days before they hit social media, you will receive the article "5 Early Indicators of a Christian Nonprofit Leadership Fall" along with the Contents, Introduction and the Appendix (My Story) of my book,
The Courageous Ask: A Proactive Approach to Prevent the Fall of Christian Nonprofit Leaders.
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