An effective board

In addition to all its other responsibilities, the board must ensure it is itself effective. A good board adds value. It creates the conditions for the organisation to thrive. 

Ineffectiveness at board level, can translate in to misdirected effort, wasted time and board members who feel under-utilised and demotivated. These result in a cost to the organisation and lost opportunities. Board development is therefore not a luxury but a necessity.

Effective boards are those where the individual members feel a part of the ‘joint enterprise’ of guiding the organisation and supporting it to achieve its mission. To achieve this state of effectiveness  it helps to have good policies, sound working practices and processes.

People

Board member recruitment and induction

A governing body as a group is only as good as the people who serve on it – trite but true!

So what matters at the outset is that you plan your recruitment well, aiming to recruit people who:

• have the potential to contribute
• are willing to learn
• are willing to commit time.   

However, those individuals need a well thought out and executed induction programme. This latter should be more than just a pile of papers to read!

Examples of good recruitment and induction programmes include:

• Governance Hub Trustee Recruitment Toolkit
• Charity Commission RS1 - Trustee recruitment, selection and induction
  
• Charity Trustees Network - recruitment and induction resources
  

Equality and diversity 

Creating an inner core of board members (these are sometimes formalised with names such as 'the Chair’s group' or ‘trustee executive group’) is potentially very divisive  It can be deeply unprofessional (not to say unfair and disrespectful) to offer differing levels of support and information to different groups of people. So a good governing body will have a consistent and agreed process for keeping all members informed and for drawing on their skills and contributions.

Attending to the diversity of your governing body is not merely a matter of ‘ticking the box’ although some governing bodies pay more lip-service than real attention to achieving this. Where there is a real belief that diversity adds to the richness – and therefore effectiveness – of the board, then a plurality of people and experience will be achievable.

This will result in a governing body peopled with differing experiences of age, ability, race, language, parent and child status, work, home life etc. Clearly your governing body will not have ‘the complete set’ of life experience within it, but the ambition should be to avoid having an overwhelming representation from one sex, religion, work experience etc. Board diversity (NCVO) is a useful guide. 

Ways of working

Effective meetings

It is easier to talk about having effective meetings than achieving this laudable aim. There are many publications which give you tips and ideas, but the key is in the planning. Chairs and their lead officers do best when they hammer out in advance what needs to be covered and how best to pre-brief governing body members. So good agendas that are not too full and are accompanied by succinct briefing papers are a good start. A key ingredient as we know is a strong but enabling Chair. Not easy but achievable!

Clear roles

Governing bodies elect or select a Chair, treasurer and a number of other officers; not all those chosen know what their roles are! Obviously you can best fulfil a role when you know what is expected! There are many organisations which offer model role descriptions for the key board member posts, including:

• acevo
• ICSA - Knowledgebank (search for 'job description')
  
• Charity Commisssion.

The significant activity that then needs to take place is for board members to work under the guidance of the Chair to agree how they are going to carry out their duties. If these can eventually be written down, you will have a set of procedures that help both board members and staff. This will also avoid time wasting through duplication or things falling through the gaps.    

Delegation

There are some functions which the governing body as a whole cannot delegate – check your governing documents and if you are a charity, Charity Commission guidance. However, some work can be delegated to sub-groups of your governing body (they may be called working parties, sub-committees etc). How you brief these groups and what powers you give them – to research, to negotiate, to act etc will need to be thought through, as well as clear to all board members and to your paid officers. For much of the above, the key words underpinning the effective functioning of any governing body are ‘clarity’ and ‘agreed ways of working’!

Assessing board effectiveness

It is obvious once pointed out, that there is a cost to having and supporting the governing body’s existence and work. The costs are in the time staff commit to preparing reports, booking dates and rooms for meetings, sometimes also for travel and other related expenses that are paid to members of the board to attend meetings. This cost is an additional reason (over and above your legal duty) to check that your governing body is effective. NCVO, acevo and the National Housing Federation, have publications with guidance and tools for measuring board effectiveness; in addition there is a host of commercial law, accountancy and financial advice firms who run seminars on the subject.

Board member effectiveness

Board members do not arrive on a governing body fully formed and perfect! We all have things to give – providing we receive good guidance and feedback on how we are doing. As with the governing body, individual members are at their most useful - and therefore valuable – when they are self reflective about their own strengths and limitations. Add to this an agreed way for the Chair, Vice Chair or other delegated member to review the work and effectiveness of each member – and you have a potentially robust process. The final ingredient to this is to ensure ongoing learning and development which grow the members’ skills, knowledge and experience. 

Further information

• Good trustee guide (NCVO) provides a comprehensive guide to the role of the trustee.
• Trustees and management committee members national occupational standards (NCVO)
• NOS standards
• Building strategic board diversity (NCVO)
• Good Governance the Chair’s role (NCVO)
• How to be an effective charity trustee (Charity Commission) - checklist of useful publications
• CC 10 Hallmarks of an Effective Charity (Charity Commission ref; hallmark 4)
• Best practice guide on the recruitment, appointment and induction of charity trustees (ICSA)

Learning from your experience

• Why do governing bodies do so little assessment of their own effectiveness? How can we change this? 
• Are board members resistant to training and development? If so why?
• Have you attended board meetings that have been poor value – for time and money expended? Tell us your story and say how they could have been better
• Do you know about a great Chair? Tell us what they do and how others can learn from them
• What resources have you found useful for measuring board member effectiveness?

Either add your comments here or talk with others on the governance forum.