Terms of Use

Using this site

These terms apply when you visit this website, use our contact form, or buy and take our courses. By using the site you agree to them. If you do not agree, please do not use it. When you buy a course, our Refund Policy applies to that purchase too, and for refunds it controls.

Education, not advice

Everything we publish, including lessons, articles and guides, is general education. It is not legal, tax, accounting, investment or other professional advice. Laws differ from state to state, and your organization’s own documents, such as its bylaws, can change the answer. Please talk to a qualified adviser about your own situation before you act.

No promises about seats, pay or results

We teach how boards work. We cannot promise that a course will get you a board seat, a job, any pay, or any result for your organization. Board pay figures on this site come from surveys, or are marked as BDI estimates. They are not a promise of a seat or of any level of pay.

Buying and taking a course

When you buy a course, you get a personal right to watch and use it for your own learning, for as long as your access lasts. The right is yours alone and cannot be transferred. Please do not:

• share your login, or let someone else take lessons or the assessment for you;
• copy, record, post, sell or share our lessons, guides or assessments; or
• build your own course or training from our materials without our written permission.

Want to train a whole board? Ask us through the Contact page.

Your account

Keep your login private and your details accurate. If you think someone else has used your account, tell us through the Contact page right away. Please do not send us your password.

The Certificate of Completion

When you finish a course and pass its assessment, we give you a Certificate of Completion from Board Director Institute.

What it is: a record that you completed that course.

What it is not: accreditation, a license, a professional designation, permission to practice, a board appointment, a promise of a job or board seat, or proof that you meet any employer’s, board’s or government’s requirements.

Please do not say or suggest that the certificate means more than that. An accurate way to describe it is, for example, “Completed Nonprofit Board Fundamentals at Board Director Institute.”

AI-generated presenter

The video and voice in our courses use an AI-generated version of Michael Barrick. Michael reviewed and approved the lesson content. The AI presenter is only the way we deliver the lessons. It does not mean a different person taught or reviewed them, and it does not change what the lessons are or what they cannot do. They are still general education, as described above.

What belongs to whom

The website, lessons, videos, scripts, guides, assessments, certificates, logos and the Board Director Institute name belong to us or are used with permission. Buying a course does not transfer any ownership to you. Please do not use our name or logo in a way that suggests we endorse or sponsor you.

Using the site fairly

Please use the site lawfully and in good faith. Do not:

• break the law or someone else’s rights;
• pretend to be someone else, or misstate your course results or your certificate;
• try to get around the site’s security or login, scrape it, or overload it;
• send harmful code; or
• send us another person’s personal information without their permission.

We may stop someone who breaks these rules from using the site.

Other websites, including BoardMatchHQ

Our site links to other websites. BoardMatchHQ was founded by Michael Barrick, but it is a separate website with its own terms and privacy policy, and these terms do not apply to it. We do not control other websites or what they say, and a link is not a promise of any result.

Changes to the site and to these terms

We may update, pause or remove parts of the site, and we may update lessons to fix errors or keep them current. We do not promise the site will always be available or free of errors.

We may update these terms. The date at the top of the page shows when they last changed. If you keep using the site after an update, you accept the new terms.

Your rights under the law

Nothing in these terms takes away a right you have under the law that cannot be waived by agreement.

Contact us

Questions about these terms? Use the Contact page.