How to engage potential trustees

How do you look to the outside world?

Before you launch your campaign, take an objective look at how you appear to the outside world. For example, is your entry on the Register of Charities up to date? Is it clear from your website and other materials what your charity actually does and why it exists? If there are things that might deter potential trustees, address these now if you can, or be prepared for questions that might crop up.

Think about how inclusive you are as an organisation and how you might appear from an outside perspective. Consider the images and language you use and how welcoming and accessible they are. For example, are all the pictures of people on your website from the same demographic? This is a good time to identify and address this.

Ways to engage potential trustees 

By the time people submit an application they should already have a picture of what your charity is like. The more clearly you can express who you are as an organisation, what you do, and the values that underpin how you work, the more likely you are to find trustees who have synergy with you.

Think proactively about what people want to know about being a trustee of your charity. If you do this on an ongoing basis, and not just when you have a live advert, it will help you develop a pipeline of potential trustees.

Things you can do:

• Produce a recruitment pack so you can provide more information to potential applicants - include your current strategy, the challenges you’re facing and why you’re looking for trustees with specific skills
• If you have events or open days where your service users can meet supporters or volunteers then invite potential applicants along
• Encourage people interested in your charity to volunteer: even if it’s only on a short-term basis it might nudge someone into joining your board in future
• Make the most of informal chats with both potential applicants and those who may be interested in applying to be a trustee further down the line.

What to share with potential trustees

Gather information together to make it easy for people understand your charity better. You probably have a lot of this material already, in different places. You can signpost people to the following, or incorporate them into a recruitment pack.

Use what you have already

Even if this is your first trustee recruitment campaign, you don’t have to start from scratch. Use what you have already. For example:

• Vision statement
• Mission
• Values
• Trustees annual report and accounts
• Strategy document or business plan including your short and long-term goals
• Role description or trustee code of conduct (if you have them)
• Extracts from funding bids
• Adverts for paid jobs in the charity
• Newsletters, magazines or other publications you produce about the charity’s work.

This will help reduce the work involved in your campaign and make sure you what you tell potential trustees directly is lined up with your wider messages.