Spotlight on Our Spool: Name It. Set It Aside. Lead with Curiosity
What does it take for a nonprofit board to put mission before organization? Live It Learn It's board chair Tracy Shaw reflects on the difficult conversations, courageous decisions, and lessons learned from a merger.
Tracy Shaw, Live It, Learn It Board Chair
At Thread, we believe that advancing the mission should always come first—even when that means reimagining the organization itself.
Few people understand that better than former Threadster Tracy Shaw, who serves as chair of Live It Learn It's Board of Directors. Tracy recently helped guide the organization through its merger with An Open Book Foundation. We invited her to share her perspective on what it takes for a board to put mission before organization—and what she learned along the way.
We exist to advance missions, and holding each other accountable for this work is critical. When the idea of a merger with An Open Book Foundation (AOB) came to the table, our board had to find out whether we truly existed to advance Live It Learn It’s (LILI) mission.
From our first conversation with Heidi Powell, AOB's co-founder, I knew in my gut that merging was a great path for our organizations. Not every board member (LILI and AOB) felt as strongly as I did. Each member had good reasons to question and research for themselves.
Our LILI board voted to run deficit budgets for three years to invest in operational structures and pay our staff a fair and livable wage. The financial risk and worry were real. Each board did the hard work anyway. LILI hosted a handful of board sessions where we discussed every question on the table.
As part of those discussions, we asked LILI’s Co-Executive Directors Maryam Trowell and Erin McSpadden to name their worries and stressors. They came to the table well-prepared with data, objectivity, and vision. We discussed their intentions to continue with LILI as co-leaders, setting the new organization up for success.
Each organization retained its own legal counsel, and four board members from each side formed a joint task force, with permission to speak plainly and move with agility. Putting mission first never meant putting caution last.
In my opinion, the turn towards yes came when Maryam and Erin showed us what was possible. Live It Learn It was already emerging as a financially sound, operationally fit umbrella organization, strong enough to start, host, and carry well-aligned programs, reach exponentially more students and teachers, and expand our visibility as a thought leader in experiential learning. Our board voted unanimously to merge.
The biggest challenge during the process was ego, starting with my own. As a long-time board member and nonprofit professional, I have strong opinions and ideas, and I'm not afraid to speak from my experience. I had to learn to lead hard conversations from curiosity instead of combat. On more than one occasion, I said out loud, "I know I'm often the loudest voice here. But this space is for everyone, and this decision demands that everyone's voice is heard."
My advice to any board considering a merger?
Ego is the biggest barrier to success: the ego of “I know best,” of “We do this better than anyone else,” or of “It's ours, we built this” (ideas, staff, donations, relationships, resources, etc.). Name it, then set it aside. Try opening every meeting with a quiet minute to acknowledge your biases, and invite people to say them out loud.
Put your resources where your mission is. Pay for outside support so the already stretched staff aren’t carrying the entirety of the merger's success on their weary shoulders.
When the vote is done, know that the work is just beginning. Build the new culture on purpose, because it won’t build itself.