Stewardship

It’s not a word one often hears in the context of association values or strategy. Maybe it should be.

It more typically arises in the context of environmental or religious affairs, but it’s a concept that deserves serious attention in organizational leadership.

Author and consultant Jeff de Cagna has made it a key finding from his community dialogue on “The Future of Association Boards,” arguing that elevating board performance “demands boards refocus their energies toward stewardship, i.e., leaving their associations better than how they found them for the benefit of [both current] stakeholders and successors. Stewardship is a higher calling than leadership and requires boards to focus their attention on building and sustaining a consistent practice of foresight to which all association stakeholders can contribute and through which today’s decision-makers can demonstrate their care for successors.” Thinking for the future; not just managing for today.

That makes sense. Adopting a leadership mindset that worries more about what the members (and board members) who will come after us will need and value than what we, ourselves, appreciate and desire from our associations. Are we focused on the right things for future boards and members, or approaching leadership through the blinders of immediate, operational urgencies and need? And on an individual level, what will future members (and board members), many of whom we may never meet, think of our time of service? Will they thank us for what we did or curse us for what we failed to do?

Now there is a trap here

Too often, associations worship blindly at the altar of change and transformation as ends in and of themselves.

But that can create a mindset where only wholesale, radical disruption strategies are considered, change for the sake of change when a more nuanced approach might be more effective. Stewardship includes the feature of conservation: preserving what is good and worthy of preservation.

There are constants

Mission, purpose, and values are things that seldom if ever require fundamental overthrow. But means to honor and preserve those ends need to constantly be kept in mind and acted upon. That is stewardship.

Now, many times in my career I have been described as a change agent, and I am OK with that. I am not afraid to make drastic changes, swiftly (and in the most severe cases, even ruthlessly), when they were necessary, due to immediate threats or where elements of the system weren’t working in a way that was holding back or might even endanger the entire enterprise if allowed to persist. 

But absent such an immediate and even existential threat (the pandemic comes to mind) it is better to maintain an appreciation that change is a constant, not a one-time goal. And effective change includes preserving what is of value and approaching its care with constant improvement. Sometimes and in some areas nurturing evolution is more appropriate than revolution.

(New CEOs in particular need to act with humility and a modicum of patience. I never approached a new engagement with the mindset of massive change on day one. No matter how good your due diligence, you don’t know the people, the systems, the programs well enough to assume you have the right answer before you get there. At best, you have theses to be tested.)

Now there is a trap here, as well

Complacency. Ignoring processes and programs that are working well enough as if no adaptations or improvements need be looked for or considered.  

The urgency for change is a spectrum

It comes down to achieving a balance: changing what isn’t working, advancing and improving what is. This requires honestly assessing the status quo. Don’t ignore or delay changes to the things that need to be fixed. But approach even those cases in a manner that recognizes those aspects worth preserving. Acting decisively when faced with a change in reality and exercising foresight in order to anticipate and address changes in the operating reality before they reach crisis levels. But not throwing out the baby with the bath water in the name of some abstract concept of change or transformation as necessarily a good to be pursued for its own sake. Equally important is not responding to long-term trends by rearranging the deck chairs on your ship. Work always with foresight: future needs understood from a clear-eyed appreciation of the current state; things as they are and are becoming, not as we wish they would stay.

Stasis is deadly. So is assuming that today’s orthodoxies remain valid. Change is constant. But it isn’t necessarily a totality. Your organization needs to be always evolving and responding to changes occurring and mindful of trends that might not be impacting you now but will overtime if ignored. Sometimes that demands entirely fresh approaches. Sometimes that demands radical and immediate action. 

But don’t lose sight of the opportunities to evolve and grow in a measured way. And engage your leadership and your members in a constant dialogue over what will be needed in the future, and how do we get there? That will leave them prepared to understand and accept necessary change when it occurs.

Disclaimer

The ideas contained here are my own. I do not speak for any organization or company.

AI may have been used to generate the image accompanying this post. I do NOT use AI to generate or edit drafts.It more typically arises in the context of environmental or religious affairs, but it’s a concept that deserves serious attention in organizational leadership.