Can a Past President Guide an Association’s Future?

Few challenges in association management have easy answers, but at least they usually have a small number of reasonable options to choose from. Who has the right skill set to be CEO? It’s likely either a leader in the association’s industry or an association professional. What to do for nondues revenue? Some mix of meetings, sponsorship, and training—and a whiz-bang product or two if you’re lucky. What’s the optimal board size? Opinions vary, but probably smaller than what you’ve got.

I’ve never heard a clear, confident answer about what a past board president is good for. 

Past presidents are often required by an association’s bylaws, but consensus about their role is elusive. A few years ago Association Management Center surveyed  (opens in a new tab)professionals  (opens in a new tab) on the matter  (opens in a new tab), asking them to rate how helpful a past president has been in realizing an association’s goals on a scale of 1 to 10; glumly, responses clustered around 5. Often, leaders are concerned that past presidents will undo the current board’s efforts: A third of survey respondents said past presidents have organized against a board initiative.

And if past presidents are troublesome structurally, they’re also a source of struggle culturally. Associations, like society at large, privileges youth—we assume that emerging members will be the wellspring of new ideas and forward-thinking leadership. Past presidents are treated more like the car that gets traded in, the coat from ten seasons ago that gets donated, the old dog that won’t learn new tricks.

There are reasonable arguments about what past presidents shouldn’t do—nobody seems to be a fan of “Past President Councils” or the like, especially if they’re actually empowered to do things  (opens in a new tab). But what should be done with them? 

A piece in MIT Sloan Management Review puts some helpful structure around the question. In “Four Key Roles ‘Elders’ Offer Their Organizations  (opens in a new tab),” business professors David Hannah and Jeffrey Yip acknowledge the reputational problems that emeritus types face—the out-of-touch-ness, the potential for meddling. But, they suggest, their minister-without-portfolio status also offers a helpful flexibility and perspective.

“Elders are less beholden to any agenda other than serving the communities they are part of,” they write. And that means they can speak to the integrity of the organization in big-picture ways that is sometimes neglected. They “ensure that core practices and values are not just remembered but actively upheld. They can explain how and why certain systems or decisions evolved. Their deep experience enables them to uniquely weigh in as organizations move through change.”

Hannah and Yip propose four distinct roles that elders can play: steward, ambassador, futurist, and catalyst. Which role an elder plays is a function of their particular strategic focus and the scope of change they’re capable of achieving. “Some organizations may have a greater need for a steward to uphold and communicate the company’s core values and history, ensuring continuity as new generations join,” they write. “Others may find an ambassador role more valuable, to build trust both inside and outside the organization and facilitate smoother client and partner relations.”

In other words, the best use of a past president may not be what the bylaws require, or a task force that may box them in. It’s about the temperament and perspective of each individual past president. Rather than seeing them as a role, look at them as an engaged, consult-able person with particular talents relating to the association. Then define a leadership position for them—tempered by your tolerance for official duties—that allows them to play a meaningful role.

I know—that answer is a little vague too. But the challenge with past presidents is that they have emerged from a clear leadership role to one where they’re defined only by their talents and experience. Don’t ignore those; leverage them.