Nonprofit board calendar template

The spreadsheet behind The board calendar, twelve months that stop every meeting being a report-out. One row per month, the five decisions on named meetings, and the send-out date computed for you. No email required.

What is in it

Tab one is Calendar. Four cells sit above the grid: Fiscal year begins, which you set, and then Fiscal year ends, Form 990 due (year just ended), and Form 990 extended due (year just ended), each derived from it by formula. The two Form 990 dates belong to the year that ended the day before the one you set, because that is the return these meetings accept and authorize, and both dates fall inside the twelve months below. Change the first cell and every month row and every filing date follows. The grid is twelve rows, one per month, with these columns: Month, which is a formula off the fiscal year cell; Meeting, which takes Yes or No; Meeting date, which defaults to the 15th of any month marked Yes and is meant to be typed over; Executive director report due, which is the meeting date minus seven days and recalculates when you change the meeting date; The one named decision; Standing agenda items; Filings and deadlines; Committee meetings; and Owner. Every header cell carries a comment explaining the rule for that column. The sheet ships filled in with a worked example for a fiscal year that begins in July and a six meeting board year.

Tab two is Standing items. Seventeen rows covering everything a board sees more than once a year, with four columns beside each: Where it goes (consent agenda, decision item, or closed session), Which meetings, Who prepares it, and Due to the chair. The due column is counted back from the meeting date, and nothing on it arrives later than seven days out. This is the tab to argue over, because it is the list that decides how long your meetings are.

Tab three is Committees. Seven rows, one per standing committee plus a compensation task force, with Meets, What it prepares, How it reports, and Decision it owns. Delete any committee your bylaws do not name. The point of the tab is the last column, which separates what a committee recommends from what only the full board can decide.

How to use it

Fill it in this order. Placing meetings before deadlines is the mistake that makes a calendar useless.

1. Set the Fiscal year begins cell to the first day of your fiscal year. Check that the Form 990 dates that appear match what your auditor expects.
2. Fill the Filings and deadlines column for all twelve months before you touch anything else: the Form 990 date, the extended date, state charitable registration renewals, the state annual corporate report, the insurance renewal, and the audit fieldwork dates from the engagement letter.
3. Mark Meeting as Yes in the months that have to carry a decision. Six is a full year for most boards. Eight if you want the audit and the budget to each get a first reading.
4. Type your real meeting dates over the defaults. The Executive director report due column updates itself.
5. Write one named decision per meeting, as a question the board will vote on. If a meeting has no decision, either move one into it or take the meeting off.
6. Name an owner per row. A person or a board seat, never a committee.
7. Copy the Standing items tab into your agenda template, and cut anything your board does not actually receive.
8. Set committee cadence on tab three so that every committee meets before the board meeting where its decision lands.
9. Take the finished calendar to the annual meeting and have the board approve it as a decision, alongside the slate.

Rebuild it once a year, at the annual meeting, for the year that starts next. The fiscal year cell is the only thing that has to change if your pattern holds.

When not to use it

Do not use it when a new executive director has been in post under six months. Who prepares each decision is still being worked out, and the calendar will be wrong by spring. Set the seven day send-out rule now and build the rest at the first annual meeting.

Do not use it during a merger, an affiliation, or a wind-down. The decisions on it are the ones the transaction will overwrite.

Do not use it if the chair will not hold the agenda. The calendar makes drift visible without correcting it, which is worse than not having one.

If your board meets to run the organization because there is no staff to run it, you need a work plan with tasks and owners instead. It looks like this document and behaves nothing like it.