Engagement Strategy, Training & Board Support

Challenge

The Institute for Family-Owned Business (IFOB) plays a unique role at the intersection of business leadership, education, and economic development in Maine. Engagement for IFOB is inherently relationship-driven—rooted in credibility, trust, and peer-to-peer connection rather than traditional nonprofit fundraising.

While board members and staff strongly believed in the mission, outreach efforts relied largely on informal conversations and individual initiative. Leadership wanted to introduce more people to IFOB’s work in ways that felt authentic and respectful, without asking board members or staff to become fundraisers or make uncomfortable asks. The challenge was to establish a shared, repeatable engagement process that aligned with the organization’s values and could be sustained over time.

Approach
The Parker Circle worked with the IFOB board and select staff through a series of remote training and working sessions focused on engagement as infrastructure, not a single campaign or event.

Rather than treating outreach as a series of presentations, the work centered on developing Discovery Sessions as a repeatable engagement framework—one that board members could confidently return to over time. This approach emphasized:

• Peer-driven invitations that felt natural and credible
   
• Clear role definition, with board members focused on relationship-building and staff managing follow-up and engagement
   
• A consistent rhythm for inviting, following up, and gathering insights
   

To support this process, The Parker Circle created a Board Member Toolkit designed to build confidence and reduce friction. Materials included invitation language, presentation resources, opinion-call questions, and a clear “Ways to Get Involved” overview. Additional work involved reviewing and developing sponsor and donor materials—ranging from introductory overviews to more detailed proposals—designed to support real conversations and adapt easily to different relationships.

Throughout, the focus remained on clarity and comfort, ensuring board members understood the process and felt supported at every step.

Impact

IFOB emerged with a clearer engagement strategy and a shared framework that strengthened confidence across the organization. Board members reported greater comfort initiating conversations, knowing they were inviting peers into a thoughtful process rather than making a direct ask.

The organization gained consistency in how it introduced its mission, gathered feedback, and presented opportunities for involvement—whether as volunteers, members, sponsors, or donors. Materials and tools made engagement easier to sustain, reducing reliance on individual effort or institutional memory.

This work demonstrated how clarity, shared process, and the right tools can transform hesitation into confidence—allowing people to engage authentically, without being asked to become something they are not.