Dave Can: Welcome to unsuitable on Rea Radio, the award-winning financial services in business advisory podcast that challenges your old school business practices and the traditional business suit culture. Our guests are industry professionals and experts who will challenge you to think beyond the suit and tie while offering you meaningful modern solutions to help enhance your company’s growth. I’m your host, Dave Cain.
Today’s topic will have interest to virtually everybody that’s listening to the podcast and it’s about using your talent and passion to give back to your community. Our guest today is Ben Antonelli. Ben is a principal partner with Rea & Associates in Dublin, Ohio with a specialty in the not for profit industry. Welcome to unsuitable Ben.
Ben Antonelli: Thanks Dave. It’s good to be here.
Dave: As this is your first time as a guest on unsuitable, we have a few things we need to talk about before we get started in our topic.
Ben: Fire away.
Dave: I noticed in your topic, as you were growing up, one of your idols, you were idolizing Bruce Springsteen and as a 10 year old, you actually wanted to be like “the boss”. Is that a true statement?
Ben: Yeah. Absolutely true. I had a brother that was a year older than me growing up. Usually you don’t take on the interest of your parents, especially at that age. My mom was a big Springsteen fan, went to concerts all the time and my brother and I, we would play the vinyls and dance around the room. Yeah, big fans.
Dave: Good. What’s your favorite Bruce Springsteen tune?
Ben: It’s kind of all the same. I kind of like them all.
Dave: A little 10th Avenue Freeze Out?
Ben: Yeah, that’s great in concert. That’s the thing, there’s all the mainstream big hits and things like that, but there’s so many things on every album, tracks, deep tracks that I listen to all the time.
Dave: I actually believe you may have been spotted in the mosh pit at the Bruce Show here in Columbus several months ago during the river tour. Would that be a true statement?
Ben: Yeah, we tried to wait for the pit. We just missed it. They do a random number selection. We actually brought a client with us, had about 4 or 5 of us, just missed the cut. I think we were the first row outside the pit.
Dave: Well, good for you.
Ben: But we got close enough.
Dave: Good for you, but again, I want to dive into today’s topic and maybe a little bit of background. The founder of Rea & Associates, Richard Rea, believed in the employees being involved in their community. As a result, one of our operating philosophies, or the operating philosophy in Rea & Associates, is “Invest in your family, your community and your future.” Certainly you’ve done that in your career, Ben.
Part of this established back in the early 80s, I believe, professional service organizations, specifically CPA firms, were prohibited from advertising. As a result Mr. Rea and Rea & Associates encouraged their employees to get involved in the community, especially not for profit organizations. That concept, that operating philosophy, has stayed and held true today.
I know from your background, I think you spend about 60 percent of your year working in the not for profit industry and I know you have passion for getting involved in inboards, and giving back to the community. That’s some things we want to talk about today. You practice what you preach and that’s really good to hear, but as giving advice, if I want to get involved in the community with an organization, how do I go about getting started? There’s a lot of young professionals, both in Rea & Associates and in our community, that want to get involved and want to give back. What would your advice be?
Ben: Sure. There are a lot of organizations, great organizations, in our community. I think Columbus is known, central Ohio, where our office stands has a really good reputation for philanthropy and where not for profit organizations thrive. The key to finding the right organization to volunteer with or join the board, it really starts and ends with where your passion is.
There are websites you can go to, http://www.volunteermatch.org is a great one, and just, you scroll through the causes. You want your passion to line up with the cause of the organization. You just start scrolling through the causes on that website. There are general category causes: human rights, animal rights, veterans organizations, the arts, youth, education. The list goes on, there’s 30 or 40 causes on there so finding one and narrowing those down to organizations that line up with your goals but obviously line up with the cause is key.
It’s real easy to, if you’re already volunteering or donating your time and resources to organizations, it’s real easy just to pursue the next step and go to the board level. Also, if you’re recruited, the best boards that are turning over and trying to recruit the young talent in the community, it’s real easy if they’re knocking on your door, but when you’re starting from scratch to pick an organization, it can be overwhelming just the amount of organizations with causes that are out there, so really start with your passion.
Dave: Yeah, I agree. I want to highlight that. I think passion is maybe where you start and end with finding an organization that fits with your ideals, your own personal operating philosophy, so I think that’s a good piece of advice. Once you find that organization, what tips do you have to land a seat on the board? Do you fill out a resume? Do you make some phone calls? Is it who you know?
Ben: Sure. Yeah, again, it’s easiest if they’re recruiting you or if they’re listing open seats and those open seats, there are nominating committees and people within an organization that are filling out and trying to diversify the talents on a board. The easiest way is to have it perfectly lined up, “I’m a CPA,” or “I’m an attorney,” or some professional that they have the need for, but if you’re starting from the ground up, we mentioned volunteering, just go to networking, getting in front of the decision-makers, reaching out to executive director, the board chair, maybe just serving on a committee. Myself, I’m serving on a committee now, on a finance committee to move up to the next level of meeting next week to go through the nomination process there. Depending on the organization, the bigger boards in town, you have to do climb the ranks.
Dave: Well, your expertise as an auditor, as a senior auditor, and advisor not only not for profit but for profit, but I want to stick with the not for profit slate for a minute, but your expertise goes not only within central Ohio but across the state of Ohio. You’re involved in many not for profit organizations state wide and even crossing over into other states, so your experience is extensive in this area. I want to dig into that a little bit deeper. What other, you mentioned the passion and landing a seat, but what are some other factors that we should recognize or consider when joining a board?
Ben: Sure. Yeah, we covered the step one. You have the passion and your goals line up with the organization, that being the important factor. Now all of a sudden, similar to joining an organization, becoming an employee of an organization, when you go through the interview process, you’re now interviewing them for certain criteria, I guess. The first thing, and coming from the CPA side of things, I’m always looking at, my first step would be just the financial position of the organization.
If it’s smaller, you want to make sure that they have sound financial practices, that the environment is of … struggling financially because it just creates a whole different risk in environment and things like that. Obviously if you’re goal is to join the board to help them turn things around, that’s great, but from financial performance, you would like them to be in a solid position.
Another piece, when you’re joining a board, there are a lot of roles, a lot of responsibilities that come with it from a legal standpoint as well. You want to make sure that the organization has, if you have access to the bylaws, things like that, the questions, and if the nominating committee or the board has a packet or an orientation, things like that. They’re going to walk you through a lot of those things, but you definitely want to make sure that maybe from a smaller organization standpoint that they have terms to look into like indemnification, D&O insurance, things like that because those things protect board members, because you are exposed. You’re making decisions on behalf of the organization and ultimately if something were to go wrong that you’re covered from a board standpoint.
Dave: Yeah. You mentioned D&O insurance. Is that Directors & Officers insurance, does that help protect you as a board member or director?
Ben: Sure. Yeah, the bylaws of an organization should have in there what would happen if you incurred, you as a board member were, I guess, sued for any actions on behalf of the organization that there would be a way to pay for and reimburse you for those services. The D&O insurance is really just to ensure that the funds are going to be there to pay you.
Dave: Sure. Well, I would think with your personal qualifications as a CPA and your vast experience in the not for profit industry that boards would love to have that kind of experience on their board. I’ve heard you say a number of times, “Yes, as a CPA I’d love to be on that business or on that board of that not for profit organization or another business, but I really don’t want to be the treasurer. I want to be a dynamic board member. I don’t want to do the bank reconciliation.” I’ve heard you say that many times, “I want to be a board member but I don’t really want to be the treasurer.”
Ben: Right, because it’s all about, part of joining a board is development, developing your own skills and expanding your current skillset. If you’re the CPA and you’re the only one on the board, a lot of times you get pigeon-holed into that category or that position. You can always put that out up front, “There’s a reason I want to join the board, and it’s not just to fill that spot,” because chances are, you’re on a couple other boards where you do fill that spot. You just don’t want to be treasurer on every board. That does take a lot of time and commitment, which is back to the other factors to consider when joining a board is what’s the time commitment going to be and what’s the financial commitment? What are the expectations of me as a board member?
Dave: Right. Maybe let’s step back for a second and again, I mentioned in the opening that the philosophy of Rea & Associates is to invest in your community, and one way to do that is become part of a board. For our listening audience, if they’re part of a board or looking for a board member and are looking for a CPA or someone from Rea & Associates, would they call you and then you would help recruit a member of Rea & Associates to sit on that board? Would that be a fair question to address?
Ben: Yeah, absolutely. I would love to help out in that cause and try to place people. There’s a lot, like I said, a lot of online resources for open positions, but yeah, absolutely. I would love to help.
Dave: In your background over as you’ve crossed over the state auditing, you’re always looking also at fiduciary duties. When you become a board member, I’m sure as an auditor, you’ve seen both sides of the fiduciary role, some good, some not so good, but as a personal board member, what does fiduciary duty, fiduciary responsibility mean to you and as I drop into a board, what does that mean to me? Let’s see what, let’s dig into that a bit.
Ben: Sure. The true sense of the word “fiduciary”, the first thing that comes to mind is putting the organizations and the entities goals and strategies and interests ahead of your own. That key term from again, not an attorney, but from a legal standpoint, you joined a board, if you signed a board contract, you’re on the board making decisions, you have that duty.
There’s three levels of duty. There’s a duty of care, and that’s to care for the assets, care for the people, the good will of the organization, the name. The duty of loyalty, there’s a … That’s kind of where fiduciary duty plays in, the loyalty part of it, and then there’s a duty of obedience. All of these duties are making decisions on behalf of the organization. Obedience is making those decisions within the frameworks of the laws and regulations.
Dave: You have a young family and spend a lot of time on family activities as well as your professional career, so it does take the extra time, the commitment to put the hours in and donate to a board, but as you walk out of a board meeting or an annual meeting or a budget hearing, emotionally, how does it make you feel as you walk out of that meeting that you know you’ve served others based on your passion for that organization? How do you feel?
Ben: That’s part of why you do what you do. You make sacrifices personally and just being a Rea Associate, and that’s kind of our culture that Rea will do everything they possibly can so that you can do things outside of your day-to-day role. Here at Rea is to serve the community, but yeah, it just gives you a good feeling helping out others and it’s very rewarding.
Dave: Now do you consult with organizations on how to fill out the board, the balance on the board, maybe the duties, help them set up agendas and do things the right way?
Ben: I would say it’s not part of the exact … when we’re doing, let’s say, the compliance procedures of doing an audit, helping the 990 is definitely something as I’ve grown up in my career, we’re at that point where I’m able to consult on those type of things, so meeting with … We meet with the board at the beginning, at the end of an engagement and those are the type of things that stick out and is setting you apart from other firms. It’s having that experience with these boards to advice clients, so that’s the advisory piece that I enjoy doing.
Dave: Time is precious for all of us. You need time to spend with that young family of yours, you need time to hang out in the mosh pit at the Boss concert. What kind of time commitment, if I’m going on a board, what kind of time commitment is common? Rule of thumb?
Ben: This is one of the things that’s case by case. There’s a wide spectrum of board involvement, the board itself versus individual members. Individual board members might spend more time than others. I’ve read and had experience up to … You’ve got board meetings every month. They could be a 3 or 4 hour board meeting. There’s prep time, reading the documents beforehand, becoming prepared. Some boards have training, some boards have retreats. If you have fundraising events, talking to donors, meeting with donors. There’s so many activities that you can go through to support the organization as a board member. You could be talking upwards of 80 to 100 hours a year.
Dave: Do you go out for beers after the board meeting?
Ben: I personally believe it promotes a good board culture. Absolutely.
Dave: Well, you get to debrief and then that’s where the real stuff happens at the after party.
Ben: Right. I was at a workshop at the Columbus Foundation a few weeks ago and some of their experts have come in and talked board dynamics and things like that. They say … and this kind of applies to a lot of groups and just anything in the aspect of team where togetherness is really, and chemistry, have a lot to do with production, how a board works together and the most successful organizations have the most successful boards. They’re successful because they care about each other and they interact because they want to.
Dave: You’re kind of young to be a partner in a top 100 CPA firm, so congratulations. You must be a mover and a shaker within Rea & Associates.
Ben: Thank you, Dave. I appreciate it.
Dave: Our guest today is Ben Antonelli, auditor, partner with Rea & Associates, with a heavy specialty in not for profit organizations. As we wind down, we just have a few more questions and I want to talk about the organizations you’ve worked with over the years. What are some of the notable differences between the way the boards operate? Some are strategic, I think, and some are probably operational. Maybe you can address that.
Ben: Right. I think that’s driven a lot by structure. You have operations of not for profit organization A versus B. If there’s a lot of change, a lot of decisions to be made, a lot of things that the board has to be really involved in in an organization, they might have a lot more strategic meetings and really have to mull over a lot of information and making decisions versus another board where things are going well and they’re consistent. They’re not really changing up the way they’re serving their beneficiaries. There can be a definitely different dynamic of not necessarily going through the motions for a board, but there just isn’t that next … There’s not a lot of innovation, I guess, or even required innovation from one board to the next.
Dave: Good. As we head deeply into 2017, what would be one tip you could give for not for profit listeners, business tip, strategic planning tip, for 2017? What do you see as you travel around the state?
Ben: Sure. I feel like I almost gave it away there with the, really just-
Dave: You did give it away but we can repeat it because it’s that important and you have the passion for it.
Ben: Sure. If I had one tip, and this would apply to any not for profit, where management is providing the information, the knowledge transferred to the board as board members cycle through and everything. If you’re really not having an engaged board, how do you go about doing and getting the board to be dynamic, to work well with each other? I don’t know. Is it happy hours? However you do that, but really focus on and work on the culture of the board and it’s going to pay off.
Dave: Good. Well Ben, thanks again for sharing your thought leadership with us today. You’re obviously very famous in this industry. Appreciate the insight. To our listeners, if there’s any additional information you need on this topic, go to our website at http://wwwreacpa.com and you’ll see some great resources, and even look up Ben’s biography and give him a shout if you have any questions. If this is your first time listening to unsuitable on Rea Radio, please subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or SoundCloud. Until next time, I’m Dave Cain encouraging you to loosen up your tie and think outside the box and enjoy the journey.