Board of Directors

The Hardy Plant Society of Oregon is managed by an elected Board of Directors, consisting of six executive officers and eight to twelve Directors-at-large. The executive positions are President, First Vice President, Second Vice President, General Secretary, Treasurer, and Membership Secretary.

How does one get to be a director or officer of the Board?

All Board positions are elective. Anyone who's a member of the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon can run for office. The usual route is to let the Nominating Committee know that you're interested; they'll ask you to fill out a form with some information about yourself. The prospective candidates are presented to the Board in order to develop a slate of candidates for election at the Annual Meeting. You can also be nominated from the floor at the Annual Meeting.

What kind of qualifications does one need to be a Board member?

For the most part, there are no specific qualifications. A few positions require some specialized knowledge: the Treasurer needs to have a knowledge of and experience in accounting and financial matters, and the Newsletter editor, who is a Director-at-large, needs at least a little journalistic knowledge and experience with publishing software. The General Secretary needs to be good at taking accurate notes, and business and/or sales experience is very helpful for the Second Vice President, who is in charge of the Plant Sales.

The most important qualifications, though, are more generalized: an interest in running a non-profit society, the time and the willingness to devote to that end, the ability to work well with other people, self-motivation, and the ability to follow through on tasks.

What's required of a Board member?

First of all, Board members are required to attend the eleven Board meetings a year at the HPSO office on the last Wednesday evening of each month, except November and December, which have a combined meeting the first Wednesday in December, plus the once-a-year retreat, usually an autumn afternoon at a Board member's house. Of course, absences can be excused, but one really does need a commitment to come to the meetings.

Secondly, Board members need to be committed to helping with the business of running the Society. This can involve chairing a committee or two and/or chairing a program or two. In fact, volunteering on a committee, or participating in the planning of a program can be a great way to get involved before being on the Board, to see how you like the kinds of things Board members do.

What's not necessary for being a Board member?

You don't have to have been a member of HPSO for an extraordinary amount of time. One of the recent Board people had been an HPSO member for 18 years - from its inception - but that's quite the exception; others have been members for varying amounts of time, some as little as 5 years. And, some of those Board members began Board service quite soon after becoming members. One five-year HPSO member joined the Board after being a member for only two years; another came on the Board the same year she became a member.

You don't have to be a super-fantastic gardener, either! A poll of the Board members showed that although about half of them considered themselves advanced gardeners, there were lots of intermediates, and a few beginning-to-intermediates, too. If you're already a member of HPSO, or if you're reading this web page, you're already interested in gardening. All that's required is that you're also interested in furthering HPSO's mission, which is mainly to promote gardening and the dissemination of information about horticulture.

Results of a mini-poll of current Board members

Let's look at some of the answers we got when we polled the 2003 Board members about why they were interesting in becoming Board members, what they felt their qualifications were, and how they participated in HPSO before coming on the Board.

Reasons for joining the Board, by 2003 Board members

• I started on the Education Committee; that lead to the Board.
• I came to a July program planning meeting and got interested in the programs aspect.
• I like the people and wanted to do my share to contribute to such a great bunch of people.
• It seemed like an interesting group doing lots of good work; I was a plant sale vendor and thought I could contribute to that, to educational programs, and to the seed committee.
• It was a chance to work on education and mentoring other gardeners. I'm a people person with good management skills and that was a good way to use them.
• I wanted to get more involved.
• I like being in the action lane.
• It was time to give back for the benefits I got from HPSO.