Scenario V3 with Powtoons

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Mini-case Study

Interview Scenario

We need more board members because we don’t have enough people.

A student team begins their kickoff meeting with a client to consult on improvements to a nonprofit board. The client begins the engagement with a clear goal for the team to focus on.

I think roles and responsibilities are unclear, which leads to duplication of efforts and inefficient use of their time.

Tasked with finding ways to increase the size of the board, the team structures interview questions around solving that problem. However, in their first interview with a board member, the subject brings up other concerns.

- "Roles unclear" - "Repeating work" - "Wasting time"

This new wrinkle leads the team to revisit their foundational assumptions. To better understand the challenges the board is facing, the students go back to the drawing board and draft a set of open-ended questions designed to explore the board’s dynamics, current operations, and any underlying issues.

Avoiding questions that might confirm the client’s initial assumption, they focus on gathering a broad range of insights, asking about the responsibilities of existing board members, the effectiveness of board meetings, and the challenges that hinder the board’s ability to achieve its goals.

Avoiding questions that might confirm the client’s initial assumption, they focus on gathering a broad range of insights, asking about the responsibilities of existing board members, the effectiveness of board meetings, and the challenges that hinder the board’s ability to achieve its goals.

As interviews progress, patterns begin to emerge. In addition to the concern about roles and responsibilities, other board members express a sense of being overburdened, but this is not solely due to a lack of members...

Some mention that meetings often lack clear agendas, leaving participants uncertain about priorities and next steps.

Others point out that the board has struggled to attract new members with the right skills because it lacks a clear vision for the board’s future contributions.

Reflecting on these findings, the students find that the client’s assumption—while addressing a visible symptom—does not fully address the underlying problem. Instead of focusing solely on adding more board members, the students start to explore alternative solutions that could strengthen the board’s overall functionality.

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Think and Reflect

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