Your Personal Board of Directors (PBOD) is a group of six to eight people you select to help with your professional development — individuals who can help you uncover your blind spots, provide specific feedback by seeing you in action, and, in some situations, advocate for you. They can help you navigate tumultuous political waters, provide you with insight on a regular basis that can inform the ways you work and think, and even change the minds of your toughest critics. (Nawaz 2016)
Selecting members for your Board of Directors
Lisa Barrington (2018) makes these recommendations:
Select people who you regularly keep in touch with. Your request for their participation in your PBOD should not be your first communication with them. This implies that you need to expand the number of people that you regularly keep in touch with.
The PBOD members are not your accountability partners unless you negotiate with them to function in that role. An accountability partner is a person who coaches another person in terms of helping the other person keep a commitment through periodic check-ins, often every one or two weeks.
In return for their services look for ways to reciprocate. This IS a quid-pro-quo relationship.
Consider selecting an individual who:
- Is a fellow fire officer
- Is in or have been in your circumstance, such as a single parent.
- Is one of your greatest cheerleaders
- Who has been and is ready to critique your actions or decisions
- Is a leader in an area in which you aspire to grow or succeed
- Is from an older generation
- Is from a younger generation
- Can introduce you to others in your profession.
One of Boston Fire Commissioner Leo Stapleton’s PBOD members came from the same recruit school and remained ready to critique actions or decisions.
As a district (battalion) chief, Stapleton responded to a well-involved Back Bay church fire that was spreading to other commercial buildings. Stapleton called for a 2nd alarm when he arrived, then a 3rd alarm as he got out of the buggy. As he sized-up the magnitude of the fire, called for a 4th and a 5th alarm. The fire had spread to ten exposed buildings.
After the fire he felt pretty good that he spread out the extra alarm assignments to make sure each company could get to their assignment.
(back at the district chief’s office) The phone rang and (Stapleton) scooped it up. It was Tom, his old drill school partner, still a fire fighter and still his most severe critic.
“Hey, big shot. Big deal, you saved all those liberals’ homes. Yer picture’s in the paper and everything. Boy, you really were cool, weren’t ya. Just like you always told me. Be methodical. Space ’em, space ’em, right?”
“Yeah, that’s right, Tom. It takes a lot of getting used to but I’ve been a Chief quite a while now,” he said.
“Yeah, well how come I heard on the news this was the fastest five alarms in the history of the Department? Five minutes from the still alarm to the fifth. Boy are you cool.”
Tom hung up and the Chief sat staring at the phone. Hm, I thought I took twice that time.
The Types of People on Your PBOD
Jo Miller (2019) describes five types of people who can help you meet your professional goals:
- The Connector: the person who knows just about everyone, the hub of a thriving social network.
- The Informational Powerhouse: the person who always has a finger on the pulse of the organization and in the broader community/industry.
- The Influencer: This person makes things happen. This person has a way of eliciting agreement and collaboration from teams
- The Mentor: This person supports your growth and development by providing advice, feedback, and guidance. A mentor also acts as a sounding board for career-related decisions and can help you navigate challenging situations at work.
- The Sponsor: Called many different names in the fire department, this person picks you and advocates for your transfer, promotion or special opportunities.
Moving beyond Mentorship
Mentorship implies that there is one person that will help you advance in the fire department. Many single mentor efforts are not effective. Developing a Personal Board of Directors, with six to eight members that may change through the arc of your career, could be a more effective approach.
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Barrington, Lisa (2018 February 20) Everyone Needs A Personal Board of Directors. Forbes.com https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2018/02/20/everyone-needs-a-personal-board-of-directors/#52f50e202bbc
Nawaz, Sabina (2016 November 10) To Get Promoted, Get Feedback from Your Critics. Harvard Business Review https://hbr.org/2016/11/to-get-promoted-get-feedback-from-your-critics
Stapleton, Leo (1983) “Chapter 28: Space ‘Em Boys, Space ‘Em” from Thirty Years on the Line. Boston, MA: Leo D. Stapleton.
Miller, Jo. (2019) Who’s On Your Personal Board of Directors? BeLeaderly.com https://beleaderly.com/whos-on-your-personal-board-of-directors/
Picture of church fire: 3-29-1968, 0217 am, Box 1539, 5 alarms plus 10 engine special alarm, 288 Berkeley St., Back Bay ‘First Church in Boston’ fire extended to adjacent buildings. https://bostonfirehistory.org/fires/
Feature image adapted from @charlottefire 12/13/2018