A strong CEO–board relationship is vital for the success of all organisations, including not-for-profits.
ChildFund Australia, a child rights and poverty alleviation organisation working in 70 countries around the world, knows this very well. The organisation offers health education and child protection programs, funds ongoing humanitarian crises in places like Cox’s Bazar and Afghanistan, as well as new and emerging emergencies like the recent earthquake in Myanmar, and has areas of expertise in online safety and sports for development.
“I always saw my relationship with the board as a vital relationship for the organisation and for us to get our work done,” said ChildFund Australia CEO Margaret Sheehan.
At Third Sector Leaders Forum 2025, she will join a roster of CEOs for a panel discussion that aims to navigate power dynamics and expectations among executives and board members. Ahead of the forum, she shared with Third Sector how they do it at ChildFund Australia.
How do you proactively manage and resolve conflicts to maintain alignment?
Avoid conflicts. In my experience, we have clear mechanisms and processes with the board (particularly with the board chair) about how we behave, run board meetings, feed into each other and provide feedback. In general, most of the time, I managed to have a board that was not in conflict with us. Apart from our four board meetings, we have two strategy sessions each year. In those strategy sessions, there’s time for strategic discussion about what people are thinking and a chance to raise and explore issues.
For example, in a recent one, we looked at the global changes and tried to make sure that the board understood the magnitude of those changes and what that meant for us. We’ve spent time trying to make sure the board is clear on locally led development and what that might mean for our changes. We have mechanisms that allow the board time to understand issues that could become contentious, and also for us to listen to them.
Sometimes, you can assume that the board knows the sector that they possibly don’t. Some people on the board have extensive knowledge, and others know only about their own area of expertise. It’s important that they understand issues. When there are seemingly conflicts, generally, there’s a bit of caucusing. Sometimes, it goes on. There are a number of people on the board. As the CEO, you not only have your link to the chair, but there’s also a vice chair and heads of different committees.
We have an audit risk committee, as well as a comms and marketing committee. Depending on what the issue is, we can talk to people about sticky issues and get them to slow down with the board, understand where the conflict might come from or what issues will be raised. It was rare that our board meetings would involve some big conflict or a disagreement that we didn’t understand.
Have a clear mechanism for resolving conflicts or reaching consensus. Often, the chair would ask everybody what they think about something. I appreciated that the board would always allow me to speak for or against something. If they had a very strong view, they would say, “What do you or the executive think about that?”
There would be opportunities to listen and discuss. But then they would vote if they needed to and reach a consensus. It’s interesting, as it’s rare that the board has voted on something. If it was contentious, sometimes they would leave it and come back.
I once thought that was not a good strategy, as I didn’t like things to get left. But over time, I learned that leaving something new, a new idea that has just been introduced to the board, is smart and wise to give it some time, even though I want to drive through it right away.
Interestingly, when we were moving out of sponsorship and had a discussion at the board, we decided to slow it down by a year. In the beginning, I was frustrated by the slowdown. But it made a difference with the board coming on within that year. They understood why and what the research was, and we understood the different views or areas where that could have been conflictual.
Consider board changes. Sometimes, especially for not-for-profits, boards change, and new people come on. You may have an issue that’s as significant as ours when we moved out of sponsorship. At the time, you had a board that supported that movement, and then two years later, you’ve got two or three people who’ve come on and don’t know the whole background.
They don’t understand that you did the research and what some of the drivers were. They don’t know the history of the funding, etc. And they might say, “Why are we doing that? Well, we shouldn’t do A, B or C.” This can absolutely cause conflict when you’ve got new members who aren’t briefed on old issues.
Occasionally, we had some good, strong members with institutional memory who would try to brief other board members about the background on issues even outside of the session. But I also learned that it’s important to make sure new members understand the context of what the boards are up to.
How do you enable effective governance while avoiding micromanagement to support strategic leadership and operational autonomy?
We’ve done it well by having clear board committees and a number of decisions being made at those committees.
Ours is a board that invites executives’ involvement. There’s only one session where it’s the board with the CEO, but in lots of the board and committee meetings, the executive team is there. So, we have our greatest expertise in the areas being discussed. In that way, we don’t have people micromanaging areas they’re not familiar with. We generally let committees make recommendations, and recommendations go up to the board. That’s a good strategy.
We talk about it. It’s a board that’s quite open. On an odd occasion, I suggested to the chair that maybe they were micromanaging and said, “I’m not sure that’s an issue for the board.” The board, in its self-evaluation, asks itself how well people think they do. Do they think that the board sometimes moves into management areas they shouldn’t be dealing with or should be dealing with at a more strategic level?
Sometimes, the board chair tells me too many details. “You’re getting into management. I’m not interested in that.” He tells me to stick to my own lane for him to understand clearly what their roles are. A while ago, we had a board member who was an expert in governance. He had done training at different times, and most of the people on our board understand that. But I have been on a board where people didn’t understand that at all and talked about their own issues, and it was a mess.
But for me, you have a good structure if the board chair and the CEO can openly express when they think someone’s going into each other’s territory. And for a number of decisions or recommendations to be made, detailed recommendations come from subcommittees that then go up to the board. In that way, things aren’t revisited too much.
How do you build a transparent, accountable and purpose-driven partnership to enhance trust, collaboration and long-term impact?
The executive team makes time and reaches out to board members when they can. When members first come on, we offer them a trip to the field to understand our work in more detail. While it’s sometimes challenging to make sure that it’s not window dressing, it’s been very good for people to understand what we’re talking about, see our programs in action and meet some of our people on the ground.
In a closed session I have with the board, though, I often feel that I talked to them about details that are sensitive or a risk to the organisation, and I found that the board appreciated that. Early in my tenure, they said they wanted that. They never wanted to be surprised by a risk that I should have shared with them.
Sometimes, that transparency stuff is a difficult dance because the more you share, the more worried the board gets and the less risk appetite they have. There has to be a certain risk appetite for you to be able to do some of your innovative work. You’ll want to tell them the truth about what’s happening, but you don’t want to scare them.
But again, when they’ve said, “Don’t let me be shocked by anything,” we try to tell them about the risk. We do very good risk analysis—we do full-year and then half-year and have the risk registered—and the board discusses their risk appetite for a whole range of different things.
We tell them when there are critical incidents. We tell them when there’s a risk and talk about some of the things we’re doing to move funds into conflict areas. We’ve taken the line, “Better to share it than not to.”
Is there anything you want to add or highlight?
Having a fully engaged board sometimes means that you must have difficult discussions or tell them about some of the risks, and then you need to push them a bit so that they will push back. Sometimes, people imagine that unpaid boards, like not-for-profit boards, are easier to deal with or that they don’t deal with significant issues. But they do, so people shouldn’t think about them that way.
Don’t miss the chance to hear from Margaret Sheehan and fellow CEOs some best practices for strengthening board relationships. Secure your spot for the forum now.
Geraldine is currently the Content Producer for Third Sector, an Akolade channel. Throughout her career, she has written for various industries and international audiences. Her love for writing extends beyond the corporate world, as she also works as a volunteer writer at her local church. Aside from writing, she is also fond of joining fun runs and watching musicals.
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