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Who is Robert, and why do we still follow his rules anyway?

ROBERTA’S RULES OF ORDER Sail Through Meetings for Stellar Results without the Gavel: A Guide for Nonprofits and Other Teams

By Alice Collier Cochran

What happens when a group of twelve diverse professionals serving on a non-profit board is confronted with hundreds of pages of nineteenth century language about parliamentary procedure? At best, convoluted and unproductive meetings. At worst, abandoning overwhelming structure for equally unproductive unstructured meetings. A misperception about parliamentary procedure in general is that because it’s effective in governmental and legislative situations, it’s equally useful in smaller civic organizations. What works in Congress, adapted from the English Parliament, is often not appropriate for smaller civic and charitable decision-making groups.

With ROBERTA’S RULES OF ORDER: Sail Through Meetings Without The Gavel, a Guide for Nonprofits and Other Teams (Jossey-Bass/A Wiley Imprint; February 2004; Paper/$26.95). Alice Collier Cochran offers a modern solution designed to help smaller decision-making groups that meet regularly—teams, committees, and boards of about a dozen members—use a less formal and more engaging approach.

Created to help the average person who has been newly elected to lead or to serve on an advisory council or nonprofit board of directors be successful, ROBERTA’S RULES OF ORDER is a book about facilitating meetings and group decision making written specifically for nonprofit leaders and members. When Robert’s Rules of Order are abandoned out of frustration and the group attempts to make decisions without any structure, there is often a free-for-all. Although it is not necessary to follow parliamentary procedure in smaller groups, it is important to have a written method and to adhere to democratic principles.

Roberta’s Rules of Order provide a structure that can be customized for meetings, decision making, and governance and allow for freer discussion among members about the issues they face. Roberta’s Rules do not impose strong control, nor do they eliminate structure. There are guidelines and special rules for meetings, but they are short and easy to learn, under the principle that whenever there are rules, everyone should be able to read them, remember them, and use them easily.

Cochran draws on 20 years of experience as a consultant and facilitator to present her common-sense approach to structuring meetings and organizations that work. Her engaging tone and comprehensive, step-by-step methodology will lead the way for leaders hoping to run effective meetings, improve governance, and more successfully achieve their mission and goals.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Alice Collier Cochran, an independent consultant, conducts workshops on Roberta’s Rules of Order for nonprofit management support organizations such as BoardSource, CompassPoint, and the Center for Volunteer and Nonprofit Leadership. She has served as consulting editor for the American Management Association’s training publication Facilitating a Workshop and has been featured in several articles in BoardSource’s periodical for nonprofit leaders, Board Member.

She has been a member of the board of the San Francisco chapters of the American Society for Training and Development, the Bay Area Organization Development Network, the International Association of Facilitators, and The Junior League of San Francisco. She’s currently serving on the national board of the American Sail Training Association, the Advisory Council of the American Cancer Society of Marin, the Session of Sausalito Presbyterian Church and the board of the Golden Gate Tall Ship Society where she also was board president.

ROBERTA’S RULES OF ORDER: Sail Through Meetings for Stellar Results without the Gavel A Guide for Nonprofits and Other Teams By Alice Collier Cochran Published by Jossey-Bass/A Wiley Imprint February 2004 Paper; 305 pages $26.95 US/$38.99 CAN ISBN: 0-7879-6423-9

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