Executive Director Annual Performance Review - Template
My nonprofit executive director performance review template was born from my own frustration as an executive director that my board didn’t know how to evaluate me. So I reviewed some of the best templates out in the field and looked at my own prior reviews and came up with this new and exhaustive template. I have now shared it with many executive directors and although some will modify it, it can be used “out of the box.”
Nonprofit performance review templates are abundant online but they NOT adequate to assess an executive director. The role is too unique and nuanced to use a normal private sector or nonprofit template.
An executive review template is primarily filled out by volunteer board members who don’t work day in and day out with the executive director. They are not observing interactions or workflows in the same way.
Nonprofit employees may be driven by passion and impact and not by profit, but that doesn’t make our jobs any less important. Nonprofit leaders, especially executive directors, should have high standards for themselves, and our stakeholders deserve quality employees. Getting feedback on your performance is part of any job. This review document can be used as a “360 Review” which means anyone working below or above the employee can fill it out.
The format for this review is carefully constructed to include some critical areas of executive director leadership. It balances responses with narrative options to add context.
This Executive Director Annual Performance Review is an online Google Form. You will copy the form (the ED Review Blank Template) and save the file so you have your own version. This is the same Executive Director 360 review I have used to ask my board and staff to evaluate me. It is completely customizable. See some screenshots here of what you’ll see.
Google Forms is simple to use. Export all responses into a spreadsheet. You may want to keep the names of those who submitted feedback for the executive director anonymous. In that case, consider having a board member shepherd the process of the review and the spreadsheet export.
Check out my other leadership courses and tools here.
I designed this executive director performance evaluation tool because my board didn’t have one. Hopefully, you find it useful. It is in Google Forms format.