Four ways charities can engage their trustees

Offering expertise, experience, and diplomacy, trustees are vital when it comes to shaping a charity’s direction. Trustees have a legal duty to act in their charity’s best interests, manage its resources responsibly, and act with reasonable care and skill. As the Charity Commission notes, trustees “play a very important role...in a sector that contributes significantly to the character and wellbeing of the country”.  

Charity trustees can also be an organisation’s most vocal advocates, with a vested interest in its success that goes beyond simply salary, since trustee roles are almost always unpaid. Instead, trustees invest time, skill, and insight into their charity with the only expectation that they deliver impact for the communities they serve.  

The 2023 Board Effectiveness Survey, from board management software OnBoard, shows that two thirds of organisations felt they had at least one ineffective board member. Two of the most common reasons behind this ineffectiveness were cited as disengagement and lack of clarity about board goals and objectives.  

For this reason, trustees can be most effective when they feel connected to a charity’s cause. As with any charity stakeholder, keeping trustees engaged and informed about charitable impact is essential, in order to help them make better decisions to affect it.  

 
Keeping trustees engaged with your digital strategy is similarly important. Engaging your trustees throughout your digital strategy adds momentum to charity goals. When building digital culture and infrastructure, it’s important to get everyone on board, and secure buy-in starting from the top. 

Below, we explore how charities can keep their trustees engaged with digital technology, with more insight from OnBoard.

How to engage your trustees 

Prioritise buy-in

For many charities, trustees can make a difference both internally and externally. They are your in-house experts. They work to support the charity’s strategic aims and help ensure good governance. Outside of their formal roles, charities can benefit from a trustee’s expertise and network. 

The first step in working to engage your trustees is to make sure that they are comfortable with what you’re asking for and onboard with your strategy. This ensures that they feel more confident about talking about it outside of your organisation and they will be more invested in finding the right solutions to help you achieve your aims.  

For example, when it comes to fundraising, The Guardian reported that many trustees don’t feel comfortable soliciting funds for their charity. But this doesn’t mean that they can’t be involved in charity fundraising efforts. 

Ian McLintock, Founder of Charity Excellence Framework said that trustees don’t have to ask for money. Simply inquiring as to “who in their own network might be engaged and help arrange an introduction or invite them to visit,” could lead to a significant donation.  

Trustees could also help boost fundraising by sending personalised emails and attending events. This visibility shows leadership and helps trustees feel more connected to your impact. 

Help your trustees to develop their personal digital brand

This is a big one. Having visible trustees on your board means getting them active on social media. 

The NCVO has key tips for developing trustee social media accounts. First, trustees should develop their own presence. They should also understand that this isn’t a day-to-day media commentary, but a strategic one. As part of having a social media account, trustees should also follow relevant people, accounts, and campaigns. 

Second, trustees should get into the habit of promoting charity fundraising events and campaigns. Ideally, trustees should not only be in-real-life charity ambassadors but digital ones too. 

Finally, the NCVO recommended that trustees know their role in a communications crisis. Trustees should be familiar with emergency social media policies. This could mean sharing press commentary or offering views if appropriate. 

Building up digital capacity in your trustee board members

We’ve previously highlighted how digital success can come from trustee board members. In order to engage trustees at all levels, charity leaders should bear in mind the digital experience of members. 

Part of the challenge in building digital capacity on trustee boards is that trustees tended to be a bit older. The Charity Commission cited that the average age of a trustee member was 57. Age diversity seemed to be an issue, while lack of diversity on the board in all areas was highlighted as a concern by 95% of human resources professionals, according to OnBoard. Almost seven in ten called for higher board turnover as a result. 

Indeed, engaging younger trustees is a good solution. Charities like the Young Trustees Movement promotes trustees under 30. The charity believes that younger trustees challenge the status quo and introduce more diversity of thought into trustee boards. 

But it is vital that all trustees have an understanding of digital and how it can support their charity. It can drive efficiency and help them find better solutions to both future and existing problems. Even internally, research shows that digital board technology can help trustees feel more prepared, access all information in a centralised location, and remove the barriers to asking the right questions.  

It’s good to think of engagement as a hierarchy of needs – while 43% of board members believe better people management would make their board more effective, 38% of board members say the same of improved processes and logistics. One fifth say they would change their technology to make the board more effective. But it all feeds into the same goals – keeping trustees engaged.  
 
 

Appoint a digital champion to corral your trustee board members

“Digital skills should be represented on all charity boards, with the aim of every trustee understanding how digital could increase their charity’s impact,” is the very first principle of Leadership outlined in the Charity Digital Code. 

Appointing a digital champion to your trustee board formalises how important technology is. A digital champion is someone who is really mindful of digital transformation and how digital can work for their charity. It is someone who is dedicated to driving digital change. 

Once appointed, your champion can bring together your digital strategy. They may also help promote the use of social media, online fundraising, and bring other trustees on the journey. Engaging with your trustee through the common purpose of being more digital can help charities affect change. 

Since trustees only meet a couple of times a year, promoting the use of digital tools encourages trustees to engage with each other. Helping trustees communicate means that decisions aren’t limited to infrequent meetings and constrained to emails. Three quarters of board members said they and staff rely too much on email as a primary means of communication, according to the Board Effectiveness Survey.