THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Ford's trustees set policies relating to grant making, geographic focus, spending, investment, management, governance and professional standards and oversee internal and independent audits. They set the compensation and review the performance of the president and all foundation officers. The board of trustees is currently composed of 13 members, including the president. Nominated by a trustee committee and appointed by the full board, trustees generally serve two six-year terms. The board, board committees and individual trustees are evaluated on an annual basis. Ford trustees bring a vast range of knowledge and experience to the task of governing the foundation. They come from four continents and have extensive experience in the worlds of academia, business, law, government and nonprofit management.

THE PRESIDENT

The trustees select the president, who implements board policies and oversees Ford's programs and operations on a day-to-day basis. The trustees and the president share the responsibility of representing the foundation in the public sphere along with other senior staff. The president continually re-examines Ford's work, looking for opportunities to hone our strategies and improve our effectiveness. The president meets with people around the world to discuss the issues the foundation works on to deepen the foundation's grasp of different perspectives on how to solve problems. In addition to overseeing the foundation's operations, the president works to communicate what Ford has learned to a broad array of audiences and also strives to strengthen the philanthropic sector's performance, legal compliance and transparency.

THE BOARD'S OVERSIGHT OF GRANT MAKING

The board of trustees determines the substantive areas and geographic focus of the foundation's grant making. Within the budget approved by the board, the foundation makes about 2,000 grants throughout the year. The board has delegated authority for approving these grants to the president and senior staff. However, all trustees serve on one of the board's three program committees that help design program strategy. Membership on those committees rotates so that trustees serving 12 years become steeped in the work of Ford's three program areas and contribute to their development and assessment. The trustees review approved grants at their regular board meetings, which take place three times a year. At those meetings, and during annual board visits to grantees worldwide, trustees meet grant recipients and learn about their work.

BOARD COMMITTEES

A five-person executive committee, comprising the board chair, the president and three trustees, works with the foundation's executive officers and acts for the board between board meetings. Trustee committees dedicated to management and governance, audits and compensation, investment, trustee nominations, transactions and proxy votes meet regularly and guide foundation activities throughout the year.
     The foundation's Web site makes available to the public documents that describe Ford's governance practices. The foundation's bylaws and articles of incorporation and the board's committee charters and code of ethics are among the documents posted.

TRUSTEE INDEPENDENCE

The Ford Foundation places high value on the independence of its board members; it requires that a majority of its trustees be independent, that all trustees serving on the audit and membership (nominating) committees be independent and that trustees on the audit committee satisfy additional standards of independence. When the staff proposes that the foundation fund an organization with which a trustee is affiliated as an employee, officer or trustee, that grant must be reviewed and approved by the audit committee. The grant action document, which is reviewed and approved by management before submission to the audit committee, discloses the nature of the trustee affiliation and confirms that the trustee played no role in the initiation or negotiation of the grant.

EVALUATION AND IMPACT

For more than 70 years the Ford Foundation and its grantees have taken on enduring problems that require sustained effort and resolve. Our work to improve lives and create opportunity has generated a broad range of knowledge and given us new insights into how we can do our work more effectively. We are eager to share what we have learned with other grant makers, experts in the field, the media and the general public. Toward this end, the foundation regularly reviews program initiatives to understand what has worked, what hasn't and how we can broaden the impact of our grant making. Evaluations summarizing some of these reviews are available in the Impact section of our site.