The Difference between Governance and Guardianship

When I first meet with the board of a church, I often start off by saying that I am going to talk about what I am not going to talk about. While governance is my area of experience and perceived expertise, I appreciate the importance of ensuring that the distinctives of a church are protected. The term I use for this aspect of church leadership is guardianship. 

Churches have some differences from other charities as I describe in A Guide to Governing Charities. While it is similar to a typical registered charity with an AGM and members voting on various motions etc., there are some basic theological and doctrinal beliefs that are woven into the fabric of that church. The guardians, gatekeepers or elders (using the biblical term) serve to watch out for those values that are not always focused on by the membership. This group of individuals who are not necessarily part of the governing board, guard the tenets of the faith. The church body will have previously decided to embrace these values which in turn should be formally accepted by each new member when they sign a statement of faith and are accepted into membership.

Are these elders who serve as guardians of the faith above the governing board of the church or the members of the church? Certainly not in a governing sense. The ultimate governing body of a registered charity is the board and that right to govern is granted by the membership. However in another sense, the elders, having been acknowledged and affirmed by the church, need to have the wisdom and courage to stand for the truths previously agreed upon by the church and stand against those who would seek to undermine those truths.

A church as a registered charity needs to balance the democratic right of members to identify the governing board while honouring the autocratic responsibility of elders to guard the values held by those same members.

Why Management Decisions Should Only Be Made By Management

More than one general manager of a sports franchise has stated "when I make decisions based on what the fans think, it's time for me to get out of my office and into the stands and become one of them".

Whether it is the member of a church, a director on the board of a Bible camp, or the parent of a student in a private school, at some point this individual will deem it their right to offer an opinion on a management decision and demand that their opinion be accepted. Pastors are hired to (among other things) make administrative decisions. Executive directors make program decisions for a Bible camp. School principals have expertise in the administration of the school. And we will readily acknowledge that expertise until that expertise does not align with our opinion.

People are entitled to their opinions. Church members can vote in a new board or join a new church. Corporate members can vote different directors onto a Bible camp board. Parents can lobby at the PTA or send their children to a different school. But when the decisions of the leader are made based on the response of a constituency, that is not the leader you want.

The rank-and-file can voice their dissatisfaction with a leader by voting in new directors at the next AGM. If the board of an organization functions using Policy Governance^®, the leader is responsible for every management decision; reporting only to the board so it can monitor compliance with the limitations which it has put in place.

Once the board, or worse yet the members, begin weighing in on management decisions, you will eventually (read soon) have utter chaos. Neither directors nor members should ever be allowed to weigh in on administrative decisions. If so, the leader would need to go to the board to get approval for every (and I mean every) decision. Directors would ostensibly have the right to determine who is hired, which volunteers are accepted, a camp menu, the pastors preaching series and the brand of toilet paper used. While some may suggest that deciding on the brand of toilet paper is ridiculous, those same people will not be able to identify at what point along the continuum of arbitrary input, the point of ridiculous was reached.

So let your board govern and your leader manage.

What Does "Charity" Really Mean?

Recently I had coffee with the Executive Director of the mission agency. In the course of our conversation my friend told me about a phone call he received from a potential donor.

“My wife and I just returned from a vacation in Honduras. While we were there we came across a situation in which a small group of believers was desperately in need of a church building. Five thousand dollars is all they need and I know your organization works in Honduras. So we would like to donate that sum to your ministry so you can send it to Honduras for their church building”.

It is not my intention in this blog to get involved in the legalities (or illegalities) of doing such a thing. Nor is my intention to elaborate on the subject of designated gifts. But let's just think about the whole idea of charity.

The term "charity" seems to have lost its true meaning. Under the Income Tax Act, a charitable gift is defined as a voluntary transfer of property without valuable consideration.  The donor must be transferring the gift to the charitable organization without expecting anything in return. Long before the complications of register charities, that was the intent of a charitable gift.

Somewhere along the way that notion has become blurred by the concept of “it's my money and when I give it I want to control where it goes and how it is spent." That perspective is very common and for the most part, legitimate. Could the potential donor unilaterally decide whether he wants to give $5000 toward a church building in Honduras? Of course, it's his money. But once he decides he is going to give a charitable donation, the playing field changes from "it's my money" to money which he has voluntarily transferred to a charitable organization.

So you can decide. If it is your money, control it as you please. If you want to donate to a charity then charity is…well…charity.