Relationships between chairpersons and CEOs in nonprofit organizations

Relationships between chairpersons and chief executive officers (CEOs) are extensively addressed in the prescriptive literature on nonprofit organizations, but insufficiently studied. The purposes of the present study are threefold: First, to examine who of the two key figures is more dominant in nonprofit organizations; the chairperson of the board or the CEO; second, to investigate the extent to which dominance in the organizations is correlated with organizational as well as board characteristics, chairperson characteristics, and his/her degree of involvement in the management of the organization, and existence and clarity of role definitions; and finally, to identify those factors that best explain CEO's dominance in the organization. The findings pinpointed several patterns of dominance, specially that CEO's dominance was correlated with organizational and board characteristics, chairperson's characteristics, and degree of involvement in the management of the organization, and the extent to which there were formal and clear role definitions. Number of hours spent by the chairperson working for the organization was the best predictor for CEO dominance. doi:10.1300/J147v31n04_04