Potential Board Member Overview

About Our Organization

The Center for Community Stewardship (C4CS) works in the areas of fiscal sponsorship and facilitation. We have almost doubled in size and activity every year for the past 4 years. Our fiscal sponsorship work currently encompasses 45 organizations. We are in the process of building up our capacity to do fundraising so we can support our community dialogue and facilitation work and provide more in-depth service to our fiscally sponsored projects. We recently moved to our first office at 116 North Few St.

About Our Board

We take pride in our Board meetings and our positive, engaged Board members. We have a strong emphasis on process and mindfulness. We start and end every Board meeting with a check-in and check-out, and sometimes do a round in the middle of a meeting. We meet every month on the fourth Thursday from 11:30 am-1 pm at Summit Credit Union on E. Wilson St. (as of mid-2020 we are meeting via Zoom.)

Who We Are Seeking

We are seeking board members who are comfortable with the growth of a start-up organization. Though our organization has been around for a while, we are in many ways currently in start-up mode. In 2020 we have triple the staff hours that we had a year and a half ago. We are still building the established practices of more established boards, and at the same time we would like to model innovative, non-traditional ways of doing things.

During a recent Board Mastermind, these were identified as important to our organization:

We Value:

  • Open, Honest, Transparent Communication
  • Practicing Appreciation
  • Mindfulness & Reflection
  • Racial Equity & Inclusion

We Practice:

  • Thinking Outside the Box
  • Taking Thoughtful Risks
  • Starting with Vision & Intention
  • Valuing the Gifts Each of Us Bring

We value continuing to add Board members of diverse races, ages, ethnicities, orientations and backgrounds to our Board. We also welcome new members to our facilitation committee.

Specific Skills & Talents

  • Marketing & Communications. As we become more visible, we would like to increase the amount and quality of our printed materials as well as upgrade our website and social media presence.
  • Fundraising. Until late 2017, we did almost no fundraising, as the administrative fees for fiscal sponsorship covered most of the costs associated with providing this service. We are seeking Board members with connections to individual, foundation, and business supporters, as well as general non-profit fundraising knowledge, to build our capacity and help us support our projects beyond what our project fee allows.
  • Community Entrepreneurship. We will be adding additional trainings and support for our fiscally sponsored projects that will also be open to the community. A board member with connections to the nonprofit and social enterprise start-up community would help make sure these programs fit the needs of the start-up community.
  • Systems Improvement. As our fiscal sponsorship work grows, C4CS would to further develop our systems, financial controls, and technology. This will allow us to streamline the project application process and expedite service provision while remaining flexible and adaptive to our many grassroots fiscally sponsored projects.
  • Connecting. C4CS is excited about increasing our visibility as a facilitation and fiscal sponsorship organization. We seek connections to a wide variety of organizations in the Madison area who might engage us to hold dialogue circles, provide facilitation training/support, or partner with us to support our fiscally sponsored projects.

Requirements for Contributions of Time & Money

Board members are expected to attend Monthly Board meetings. Our Board is active and engaged. All Board members currently serve on a committee. Some of these committees meet quarterly, some meet weekly, and some are short-term committees that meet several times and then disband. Our current committees include Finance & Personnel, Community Conversations (e.g. facilitation), and Fundraising. We sometimes have short-term event and strategic planning committees.

We estimate a commitment of 3-5 hours a month. We encourage monthly donations from our Board members, but we do not require Board contributions.

Board Membership Process

  • Meet with the Board Chair and Executive Director for introductory conversation
  • Attend board meeting as observer/participant
  • Indicate interest & Join the Board
  • We will offer a Board Orientation within 2 months of joining

We encourage you to visit our website at www.community-stewardship.org as well as our Facebook page for additional information. To set up a meeting please contact Executive Director Lisa Dugdale at 608-212-2451 or ldugdale@community-stewardship.org.