But; You Must Know this! [09/9] “Preparing Board-Packs”

[01] Preamble: This is a sequel to “Generating Committee Business”, article [08 of 8] with particular emphasis on the documentation that needs to be served on Committee-members. As such, it builds on the mantra: What cannot be described, referenced and or filed should never be discussed in a committee let-alone voted on. It equally stands on the pursuit of eradicating malfeasance as articulated at article [2 of 2]. A blend of these two results in the issuance of informative board-backs.

[02] Board-Packs: It is a dossier that  should be comprised of the following documents, at least; (i) Previous minutes, (ii) Notice of Meeting (iii) Agenda of Meeting (iv) Motions that shall be moved; as initial drafts (v) Supporting documents that have motivated the motion.  Time does not allow us to go into each and every one of the above. I mention this in passing; items (iii) to (v) are closely linked and may be differentiated a follows: (iii) The Agenda; is a topical outline of the item that shall be discussed while (iv) The Motion: is a statement that details the desired action and the basis of seeking the Committee’s endorsement of the same and lastly (v) The Appendices are the basis of the request and or claim at (iv).

[03] As such, the Board-packs may be issued in hard-copy or soft format.  I recommend the later. It is cost-effective to send these as soft copy, as printing and mailing costs are significantly reduced thereby. Whereby printing is unavoidable, I would advise that these be limited to the Chair and Secretary who may need to have these in hand as signed copies for authentication. Otherwise, technology has been a blessing in this regard and so has been the COVID 19 pandemic, which has forced some committees to embrace technologies in the conducting of effective meetings. Lastly, where Board Management Software is in use the electronic files may be accessed and reviewed with much ease as compared to perusing through printed files.

[04] Notice Period: Regardless of whether the Board-pack is served as a hard-copy or electronically, the window between the date of service and the convening of the meeting ought to be adequate for members to have ample time to review the pack and make suggestions on amendments that may need to be taken into account before the meeting is held. In essence, there ought to be adequate time for the final copy to be forwarded to the members and where a member is persuaded to take a certain position on the matter, the same can share his or her findings ahead of time so that the Board can take those observations into account prior to the deliberation phase. What this does is: it deepens the quality of decision-making as it is under-girded by a solid research. Hence, to deny members access to Board-packs until a few days before the meeting under the ploy that; committee-business must be guarded against leaks is a tenuous argument at best! To take this suicidal approach is to concede that the committee is bereft of skill and appropriately placed individuals on the corporate ladder. After all, the trade-off is to water-down decision-making and that could prove more costly than a leakage of an agenda which is yet to be deliberated and voted on.

[05] Conclusion:  Committee-business cannot be transacted in a haphazard manner. And, it is the timeous issuance of the Board-pack that sets any committee on the pathway to success. Above all: this is the core-responsibility of the Committee Secretary in as much as; it is the right of any and all members to be served with the same on time. A member who is complicit in deliberating-on and thereafter voting on an issue that has not been served in a Board-pack is either in dereliction of duty, negligent, incompetent and or; all the preceding. This you must know!