About Boardwise
Advice from someone who has sat in the chair.
Boardwise is the governance practice of Jeff Kiers. Practical guidance for nonprofit boards, informed by more than 15 years of board service in Alberta.
Jeff Kiers
Founder / Governance advisor
The experience behind the work
Good intentions need
a structure that holds.
I came to governance through board service. Over 15 years, I served on the boards of Shiloh and Vanguard College, chaired the governance committee on both, and spent two and a half years as Board Chair at Shiloh.
Those roles meant working through the tension between a board and the people running an organization. I saw how unclear responsibilities, missing policies and decisions made in the wrong place could affect people’s work and the mission they cared about.
I started Jeffrey Kiers Governance Solutions to help boards put that structure in place. Boardwise brings that work together: focused reviews, facilitated sessions, practical documents and ongoing advice for chairs and executive directors.
The aim is straightforward. Your board should understand its role, know what it has decided and give its executive director clear room to lead.
How I work
Practical by design.
Start with the actual issue.
Understand the organization, its governing documents and the question the board needs to resolve.
Make the responsibilities clear.
Put roles, decisions and expectations into language that directors and staff can use.
Leave something useful behind.
A prioritized next step, a working document or an agreed practice that the board can carry forward.