Boards working on strategic planning or other governance priorities will frequently rent a boardroom outside the organization’s offices. Whether the boardroom rental is at a resort hotel or a downtown office service, not all meeting rooms are equal. As an external Board facilitator, I’ve had the opportunity to observe what makes good and bad meeting [...]
Association Governance - Evolving From Operations to Oversight Here are the most common trends we are observing in Association governance: Board roles are being redefined to focus on governance and oversight from operations and staff direction. Board composition is being realigned towards risk, strategy and subject matter expertise from member representation. Board operating processes and [...]
Recently, I was contacted by a friend looking for some governance insight. She had been approached to be the Chair of a young, fast growing start-up. Although she didn’t have any Board experience, there were many logical reasons the start-up had reached out to her. My friend wanted to understand everything she could about being [...]
Boards Fail Often (more often than it seems) We are passionate advocates for strong corporate governance. We believe good governance leads to organizational health and sustainability. We get depressed when another large (frequently public) organization bites the dust or hits the skids. Whereas the press and many others seem to blame management, we frequently find [...]
Corporate governance is most effective when Directors share a common understanding of what is corporate governance, the Board’s governance role and the key building blocks for achieving effective corporate governance. This presentation has been used by Associations, private business and not-for-profit Boards of Directors to define corporate governance and the role of the Board of [...]
What Association Board type are you - oversight or operations? As Boards of Directors strive to improve their governance effectiveness, a key challenge many face is striking the right balance between oversight and operations. Many Association Boards started with an operating focus. It was the Boards of new and emerging associations who brought [...]
How many Directors should your Board have? Nine. Ok. It depends. Here’s how to think about it: The logic of Board of Directors Size and Composition For most organizations, a Board of three to four Directors is likely too small. A Governance Board’s role is to provide oversight of risk, strategy and CEO performance. Doing [...]
Is your Board too deep into the operation? Generally, we find that Directors are very aware – perhaps too aware – of crossing the line from governance into operations. It can be confusing to try and understand how deep is too deep. Here’s how we think about it. The governance Board’s role is to: identify [...]