So you want to be a board member?

My term as board member is up in April, 2008, as is one other. I would like to use/create a job description for the two open posts and I have a two part idea in mind that I would like to see if there is anything that already exists.

1) I saw an advertisement for a board member of an HOA year's ago that was humorous, highlighting all the reasons why anyone in their right mind wouldn't want to serve on the board. Has anyone seen it, or something similar? This would of course, just be an attention getter.

2) To follow the attention getter, I would like to include a serious job description (in general terms) and wondered if there was anything already floating around?

Thanks,
Angelia

Besides being motivated to seek a Board position, a candidate should also have some basic business and leadership skills. Here are a set of minimum skills that one should have:
• Administrative skills (establish plans, manage execution)
• Communication skills (speaks effectively, runs effective meetings, prepares written communication)
• Interpersonal skills (relates to people, able to give and take, manage disagreements)
• Leadership skills (provide direction, influence others, steps forward to address difficult issues)
• Organizational knowledge (understand and use financial and quantitative data, understanding of issues relevant to the association business)
• Thinking skills (considers broad range of factors when solving problems and making decisions, gathers relevant information, makes timely and sound decisions)
• Finally, since volunteers are not usually lining up at the door to be a Board member, probably the most important last skill and one that supersedes all of the rest is; can you breathe on a mirror and make it fog up?

Deciding to run for or accept a Board position is one of the steps discussed in the start-up kit designed for starting up a new association (or strengthening an existing one)and can be found at www.*************.com under the Contents section.

JoeK