Who builds Board Manager

Board Manager is built and operated by Upspire Studio, founded by Shawn Kemp. It is a small independent software studio, not a venture-funded platform with a sales team. When you email about a problem, the person who reads it is the person who can fix it.

Nonprofits with zero to two staff, where board administration lands on whoever has capacity: an executive director between grant deadlines, a board chair on a Sunday evening, a secretary keeping records in a spreadsheet that only they fully understand.

These organizations have the same governance obligations as large institutions — terms, conflict of interest disclosures, committee records, succession — with none of the administrative infrastructure. Most board software is priced and designed for the institutions. This one is not.

The Starter plan is free and stays free: member records, terms, committees, meetings, the recruitment pipeline, and the skills matrix, for up to 25 members and candidates. The Engage plan is $19 per month and adds onboarding checklists, compliance signing, and higher messaging limits.

Community foundations are comped. Revenue comes from subscriptions only — we do not sell data, run advertising, or take commissions on anything your organization does.

The articles in the learning hub are written against primary sources: state nonprofit statutes, the governance section of IRS Form 990, and the bylaws patterns that turn up repeatedly across small organizations. Where a question depends on your state or your own bylaws, the guides say so rather than offering a confident national answer that does not exist.

They are general information, not legal advice. For a decision with real consequences, talk to a lawyer who knows your organization.

Board rosters contain personal information about volunteers who did not choose your software. We treat that seriously. The security page explains where data lives, who can reach it, and how to get it back or delete it, and the privacy policy covers the legal commitments.