NSNA Leadership University Library - Bylaws and Policies Activity
Earn credit by Participating in the Bylaws and Policies Committee
As an NSNA leader, you’ll learn and practice important leadership skills by participating in the NSNA Bylaws and Policies Program. The following may be helpful when approaching faculty to explore the possibility of having your NSNA participation partially fulfill course requirements or independent study elective. Use your course syllabus, if there is already one available for NSNA activities at your school, to see if you can meet the objectives with the following leadership activities. If your program does not already have a NSNA activity for credit course option, speak to your advisor about drafting your own independent study syllabus or petition (see
NSNA Leadership U Models from Participating Schools for more guidance in this area). You can tailor them to meet your needs!
Whether you are starting from scratch or updating already existing policies and procedures, by taking on a policies and procedures project you are helping provide a strong foundation for your chapter. Policies and procedures are imperative to ensuring consistency from board to board, which is one of the main concerns of state and school chapters. With a firm set of policies and procedures in place, new board members won’t have to spend time wondering how to go about organization business so they can focus more on working towards their goals for the year right away. So let’s get started and don’t forget you can get credit for this policies and procedures project through Leadership University, so be sure to check out the Leadership U
Bylaws and Policies Project and other links on the NSNA website!
Before Getting Started
Policy - A definite course of action or position adopted by a board of directors, house of
delegates, or any other authorized voting body.
Procedure - Set method of conducting and managing business.
In general, a policy is a more overreaching guideline that directs the action of the organization, whereas procedures are specific to a task and guide internal business practices usually carried out by board members.
*Please note that starting your Policies and Procedures Manual should be done
after establishing your chapter bylaws, since many policies surrounding membership, board member and organization structure, etc. are laid out in bylaws already. Information on how to start those can also be found in the
Guidelines for Planning Bylaws and Policies Booklet.
Creating a Policy and Procedure Manual for Your Chapter
Starting from scratch can be intimidating, but following these steps will get you off to a great start. It’s also important to remember that policies and procedures are fluid, this can relieve some of the pressure when you remember that what you are writing is not “written in stone” so to speak. If you write something that ends up not working or is not approved by the voting body then it will be easy to go back and change them.
Below are the steps to creating a Policy and Procedure Manual for your chapter. As you follow the steps you can print out or put on a thumb drive or disk the documents that will be voted on for approval. Whether it is the Executive Committee, Board of Directors or membership that is going to be voting voters will need the documents in advance. For this reason have them ready at the meeting before voting is scheduled to take place or electronically send them ahead of time.
Step 1: Look at What NSNA Policies Your Chapter May Like to Adopt
Right off the bat there are some NSNA documents you can look at adopting. These policies guide the direction of NSNA and as a constituent organization with the same purpose and function it is likely that your chapter will be headed the same way.
No need to reinvent the wheel, just adopt any or all of these:
- NSNA White Paper on Health Care Reform (more information available
Plenary Session on Health Care Reform)
Step 2: Use Available NSNA Policy Templates
There are other NSNA policies that will need slight rewording to be adopted by a state or local chapter organization. Again, it’s easier than creating them from scratch. Just change the parts that need to be changed by inserting your organizations name or making it applicable to state/local structure.
Step 3: Write a Few General Policies that Name Consistent Resources
Many times when a new Board of Directors come to office they are not aware of the resources available to them. There are a few general policies that can be put into place to ensure that members know where to look if they want to participate in chapter activities. For new chapters, NSNA resources are perfect for this and as the chapter develops its own program activities members can add to these resources.
Some example of these simple policies are:
Step 4: Review Sample State Policies and Procedures to Get Further Ideas
Even for school chapters, reviewing the Sample NSNA State Association Policies and Procedures from the Membership can be very helpful. It contains some great examples. When reviewing these ask yourself what needs to be written first for your chapter. Do your organization need some financial policies right away (usually one of the first priorities) or is a trip coming up so you’re more concerned about travel policies? Either way, you can find some that you think will work, restructure them as needed, or get some ideas and go from there.
Step 5: Ask Other Board of Directors Members to Write Policies and Procedures that Relate to Their Positions
No one knows better what financial policies and procedures need to be in place than the Treasurer and no one knows better what policies and procedures should be in place for recording the minutes than the Secretary. Be sure to tap into these resources when you are creating your Policies and Procedures Manual. If you’re working under a deadline give them one too, but be sure they know that they can always add to them. Also, make sure their deadline is before your actual deadline so you have time to review their work, edit, and ensure that there are no conflicts or repeating information.
Step 6: Pull It All Together
Steps 1-5 give you a great start to a Policies and Procedures Manual for your chapter. Now it’s time to pull it all together and fill in any glaring blanks you see. There may not be any right away, but next time something doesn’t go right or there is a situation where members aren’t sure how to handle consider how a policy and procedure might help next time.
Updating Your Policies and Procedures Manual
It’s best to routinely update your Policies and Procedures Manual yearly. But most revisions are spurred by problems. A common example is an alcohol policy. Chapters often don’t adopt an alcohol policy until something bad happens and the need for a policy becomes apparent. However, this is actually a perfect example of why preemptive policies are so important. By being proactive you can prevent these kinds of problems from happening in the first place. Below are some steps that you can take each year to ensure that your policies and procedures are up to date.
Step 1: Review Steps Above for Creating a Policy and Procedure Manual and Check to see that Your Manual has all the Components Mentioned
Step 2: Look for Policies that May be Outdated
Are you still operating like a 50 member association even though you now have 500 members? It is always better to have your policies reflect your current state and if anything else, plan for a time when you will be even bigger. An example of this would be a 200 member organization with a policy that states: “The Vice-President will call all SNA members to inform them of the date, time, and location of the upcoming meeting.”
This Policy was probably written when the organization was just starting and now that it has grown, is no longer feasible. It would make sense for this policy to be updated to something like: “The Vice-President will send out a mass email to the student body reminding them of the date, time and location of the monthly (Name of Organization) meeting.”
Step 3: Check to Make Sure you Policies and Procedures Match your Bylaws
We are usually better at updating our bylaws than we are our polices and procedures manual. This can lead to discrepancies between the two documents. A classic example would be the Policies and Procedures Manual outlining duties or procedures for an officer that does not officially exist per the bylaws. If there are discrepancies like this the Board of Directors will need to have a discussion about which document needs to be changed in order to get them to match.
Congratulations, you should be off to a great start now! The work will be challenging but it is also essential to the growth and success of your chapter. If you have problems along the way contact the
NSNA Bylaws and Policies Committee Chair, or email NSNA Headquarters at
nsna@nsna.org.
Also, don’t forgot, during this process you will be educating other NSNA and Board members about the importance of policies and that makes you eligible for the NSNA Bylaws and Policies Award. Be sure to apply, you could win recognition and $100 for your school or state. And as an NSNA member you can earn important credit through NSNA’s Leadership University.
Click here to find more information on how to
get academic credit for your NSNA activities and the
Leadership University Submission Form.