FCCS News & Insights

Annual Board Self-Evaluation Yields Value at Capital Farm Credit

Recognizing an opportunity rather than seeing only a requirement, this year the Capital Farm Credit (CFC) board of directors took a new, deeper and more targeted approach to their annual self-evaluation process, working with FCCS to gain insight into board performance and expectations.

“We’ve always managed our board self-evaluation internally, but this year we wanted to increase the value from the process by using an outside expert to potentially identify or highlight things we may not have been thinking about,” says Jennifer Thompson, CFC’s Chief Administrative Officer who worked closely with the board’s Governance Committee to coordinate the self-evaluation process. “The FCCS process created new opportunities for discussion by enabling us to ask different questions and see more detailed, analyzed results.”

Working closely with Leslie Hilton, FCCS Vice President of Governance and Board Development, the Governance Committee first discussed their goals and general competencies the board wanted to explore through the evaluation survey, informed by recommendations from FCCS. The next step was to develop the actual survey of 30 or so questions, which were selected from among hundreds of categorized possibilities available in the FCCS Question Bank.

“By building the survey themselves, our Governance Committee grew to really understand the process and they appreciated being able to select the competencies and the nuanced questions that would yield the most valuable information for our board,” says Jennifer. “They were also able to add a custom question to gain insight into a topic specific to CFC.”

Once the directors completed their responses to the final survey, FCCS tabulated and analyzed the results to identify areas of statistical interest – comparing the measure of importance of a competency to the board’s actual score. Leslie then presented the results to the board and facilitated an open discussion of the implications for the board and ways to improve or strengthen specific facets of their performance. Following that conversation, the board is now exploring action plans to improve areas identified as being key for their continued success.

“The breakdown of our results and the facilitated discussion about them presented a new opportunity for meaningful discussion about how to increase the board’s value in leading the organization,” says Jennifer. “We were able to get specific and targeted feedback on the areas we want to explore, and even general insight from FCCS about how other Farm Credit organization boards are addressing similar challenges.”

Pleased with the results of this year’s board self-evaluation, CFC anticipates turning to FCCS again next year, at which point the board will revisit their survey, weighing the value of trend data from asking the same questions against gaining insight into a new performance area.

“Forward-thinking boards like Capital Farm Credit’s are recognizing their opportunity and responsibility to add value to their organizations,” says Leslie. “The self-evaluation process is a cornerstone of that objective, by identifying specific areas of strength to preserve and opportunity for improvement that will empower them to be better strategic leaders.”

For more information or support with your annual board self-evaluation, contact Leslie Hilton at 303.721.3215 or via email.