Our September board meeting will be Monday, Sept. 9 at 1pm ET(NA) right here.
To join in the conversation, watch for the video stream to appear at the end of this post. (There will be no video there until the meeting begins. If it's 1pm or a few minutes after, and there is no video, please wait for it – we may just be starting a few minutes late).
To ask questions, to share observations, to participate as part of our community – tweet to us using the hashtag #CTFuture.
Coming Up to Speed
There are three items the board will be using, to come back up to speed for this month's meeting. If you're participating via this blog post, you can find those here:
- Video introducing the agenda (click here)
- Video report of the past month's activities and progress (Video includes a tour of our new office and Convening Space! Click here)
- Written report of the past month's activities and progress, tracking our strategic objectives for the year (Click)
- Minutes (yet to be approved – click here) describing last month's discussion, as jumping off point for this month's discussion
Agenda Item: Budget Process (Continued)
Last month, the board began asking foundational questions that we wish all leaders would ask (and that sadly, few do): What do we want a budget development process to make possible? For whom? And what would the process have to look like to accomplish that?
This was NOT be a discussion of the budget itself. Instead, we began considering the process by which the board and the organization will develop budgets and approve them. The questions we asked led to conversations we wish the leaders of every effort could have – not just community benefit orgs but any enterprise, any government, any business, anywhere…
- What could the budget process make possible, and for whom?
- What would a budget process look like if it were rooted in abundance (vs the assumption that we will always be filling in the hole?)
- What would a budget process look like if it were built upon ALL the assets the organization has to work with, rather than just cash?
- And what if the budget process wasn't a discrete function, but an ongoing way of being – developing programs, creating plans, budgeting, assessing, rethinking, re-planning – a more organic process towards accomplishing the mission?
If you have found budget discussions to be tedious; if you have found that the only question boards and enterprise leaders ask about budgets is "Does it balance?" or "How will we have enough?"; if you have been frustrated that there has to be a better way… join us by watching the video below, and tweeting to #CTFuture.
We look forward to "seeing" you right here!