Small organizations such as those for youth sports programs, community groups, children’s programming, churches, etc., rely heavily on volunteers to make up their boards. These volunteers can have responsibilities from setting policy and determining organizational direction to managing annual startup and day to day operations. These volunteers can come from the organization's membership or be individuals looking to give back to the community. In either case, the tenure of these volunteers is typically short and spans 2 to 3 years. On top of that, a lot of the individuals who volunteer are not familiar with how boards operate, what the mandate and strategic direction of organization are, and sometimes even what the expectations and requirements are of the role that they have volunteered for.
With all this continuous turnover and uncertainty, it is no surprize many of these organizations face several common struggles:
Program continuity
Repetition (re-inventing the wheel)
Communication
Recruitment
Due to the size of these organizations, and their limited access to funds, they also lack the ability to access expensive board management software that would help with these issues.
That is the void that OMyBoard is here to help with. Our goal is to provide an application that will help organizations address all these issues and at a reasonable and affordable cost.
Maintaining the continuity of the organization's mandate and vision is difficult in a world of constant turnover, especially where these have changed and matured over the years. If these details are not readily available to new members as they join the board, the organization runs the risk of decisions being made or actions taken that by the board that contradict and, in some cases, can unknowingly undo previous decisions on mandate and organizational direction. This can create issues for the current and future boards when dealing with the organization's benefactors, who have certain expectations based on the previous decisions.
OMyBoard helps address these issues by providing one central place to record, store and access this information. Board members can reference and review this information before making decisions that impact the organizations mandate.
The continuous turnover in board members also means that new volunteers are constantly taking over for others who have "already done it". Typically the ongoing activities required to be done by the board (such as scheduling, membership renewal, projects, fundraising, etc.) are known and passed on. However, too often the specific details involved in performing these activities are not. Having these details available would give the new members a place to start from without having to repeat the past efforts and figure it all out from scratch. Also, passing along the successes and mistakes of the past will allow these organizations to get stronger, more efficient, and prosperous over time. This is a big factor in how "for-profit" organizations succeed. Organizations that rely on volunteers should be no different.
Similar to the continuity issue, OMyBoard helps boards pass along this essential information by providing one central place to record, store and access it. Furthermore, the information can be categorized and associated to specific committees set up under the main board, making it easy to find the details needed for specific activities.
In a world of multiple media options, it is often hard for board members to keep track of conversations or documents as they float around in different e-mail threads or chat applications. Something as simple as trying to determine availability for a meeting can be a chore when the only forum for doing this is via e-mail or a group chat. Sharing documents this way can also quickly lead to multiple versions of the document existing with different content, resulting in a lot of effort to determine should and shouldn't be included, and with merging it all back into one document. This can lead to confusion and frustration within the board members and may result in the loss of some vital information.
There are several different options out there that could help organize this information, but these are usually set up and used based on the preferences of the current board and get lost over time as the board members and their preferences change. It also usually requires the use of 2 or 3 different applications to address all the organization's communication needs. This can become cumbersome for some board members and may also result in disconnected information, if not managed properly.
OMyBoard provides all this in one spot. Allowing the board to store documents, plan meetings with expected attendance, share meeting agendas and minutes in a central place and communicate important messages to board members and other stakeholders or members. Members will always know where to go to get the information they are looking for or provide the information they are responsible for.
There are many times where people would like to volunteer and help, but they just don't know what position would make sense for them and don't know where to find out the information on what board positions are open or what the specific responsibilities are of the positions. A lot of people won't bother with it if they need to reach out to someone for the information, rather than have a place they can do their own research into it.
Another issue facing volunteer boards is reaching potential candidates and informing them of openings that require filling.
OMyBoard helps to fill this gap for both individuals wanting to get involved and looking for information and the boards looking for candidates. Your Board's positions, the responsibilities of each, who currently fills them and when their tenure is up, plus any vacant positions are all readily available under your board's account. Anyone interested in volunteering can join the board as a Viewer and they will have access to all this information and more. Board's looking to recruit or raise interest from potential candidates and send out notifications to everyone that has already joined the board or can send out a communication directing anyone on their mailing list to access their OMyBoard account and review all of this information.
Manage Your Board - Define your board's positions and who holds the position.
Manage Member Access - Invite members and define their level of access.
Event Calendar - Schedule and manage meetings and events, including attendance.
Meeting Minutes - Record and access minutes directly in OMyBoard.
Document Library - Store important documentation for easy access by board members.
Send Notifications - Communicate important information/announcements to board members.
Committees - Create sub-committees for your board that function autonomously but enjoy the same/similar functionality of OMyBoard.
Switch Between Boards - One personal OMyBoard account can be used to access multiple OMyBoard boards that you belong to.
To get started, review the Registration or Create or Find a Board
pages. These are in the Index to the left of this page.