Current Presidential Report to the Board

At every annual board meeting held in October the president is to give a report to the full board describing the presidential goals of the last year, major accomplishments, other information that he deems pertinent, and the goals for the following year. The board is given the task to review the report and make recommendations.

During this October's annual board meeting, Dick passed out his report and gave a verbal presentation to the full board. We were then asked to give consent to the report and continue with our agenda. I raised an objection to this on the grounds that we were rushing through an important process. There did not appear to be a methodology in place that demonstrated that Dick was achieving the goals that are set within the priorities plan and governance documents. In a memo titled "How Can Goddard Become the National Leader in Progressive Education", Dick states that many of the ideas he outlines come from the various college constituencies (current and past: campus and off?campus students, faculty, administration, alumni, trustees, and the previous president). Many of his presidential goals are centered around working in collaboration with the community. But supporting evidence of how this was being achieved was merely anecdotal in nature. The only items that were substantiated in Dick's Presidential report were those that could be numerically quantifiable: enrollment figures, unrestricted and restricted giving figures, budget surplus, and amount added to the endowment fiend. But not all of the information the board needs to evaluate our

"In The Change Masters, Kanter characterizes the problem solving techniques of innovative, entrepreneurial corporations as `integrative: the willingness to move beyond received wisdom, to combine ideas from unconnected sources." In order to promote ingenuity, these organizations broadly conceptualize rather than disaggregate problems and then "create mechanisms for exchange of information and new ideas across organizational units (and) ensure that multiple perspectives will be taken into account in decisions."... Effective boards eagerly sought information from disparate sources likely to have diverse points of view. Ineffective boards did not. For better boards, additional information and differences of opinion provided the intellectual resources and energy to explore alternatives and synthesize options. For ineffective boards, more information and different viewpoints more often than not confused matters. Not surprisingly, these attitudes extended to the value of hearty debate." -- excerpted from The Effective Board of Trustees (1991).