16 March 2017

• 9.30AM - 10.00AM
  Registration and coffee
  Registration and coffee
• 10.00AM - 10.15AM
  Introductions
  Introductions
• 10.15AM - 11.30AM
  Ensuring boards and their chairs fulfil the governance role

  Role and expectations of chairs

  • The chair’s leadership role
  • Limitations on the chair’s role
  • Respecting the collective authority and responsibility of trustees

  Ensuring boards fulfil their governance role

  • Trustees’ role and the chair’s relationship with trustees
  • Success and failure of organisations - the link with governance
  • Three different models of governance and what each has to offer
    • The three key strands of governance: corporate/fiduciary, strategic and impact governance
• 11.30AM - 11.45AM
  Tea and coffee
  Tea and coffee
• 11.45AM - 1.15PM
  Making informed decisions, addressing the right issues and refreshing the board

  Making informed decisions

  • Ensuring the board gets the information it needs for good governance
  • When too much detail is dangerous; when detail could be important
  • What should be in a CEO’s report to the board
  • What constitutes a good proposal to the board
  • Basic rules for board papers
  • The chair’s and CEO’s role in quality controlling board papers

  Making sure your board is addressing the right issues

  • Why well-crafted agendas are so important
  • Why planning is vital to help boards fulfil their duties and responsibilities, and stick to their governance role

  Refreshing the board and finding new trustees

  • Providing support and ensuring new trustees become effective as quickly as possible

  Work in two's and three's to find solutions to two different scenarios.

• 1.15PM - 2.00PM
  Lunch
  Lunch
• 2.00PM - 3.15PM
  Case study of where things went wrong – tackling difficult/sensitive situations and learning from others’ mistake
  Delegates split into groups to decide how best to lead the charity in the case study out of its difficulties
• 3.15PM - 3.30PM
  Tea and coffee
  Tea and coffee
• 3.30PM - 4.15PM
  Building relationships

  Building a successful chair/CEO relationship

  • Behaviours that can damage the relationship

  Chair/CEO and CEO/board relationship

  • Ensuring the board can hold the CEO to account without meddling in management

  Open session - a chance to raise any other governance issues

• Dorothy Dalton

  Dorothy Dalton is a leading expert on governance who has written several books on the subject. She was editor of Governance: essential information for effective trustees from July 2005 to January 2016.

  With a ‘first’ in mathematics, Dorothy, a former Headteacher, was chief executive of ACEVO, the association of chief executives of voluntary organisation from 1992 to 2000. She is currently chair of trustees at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital Charity. She has been a trustee of many charities including Marie Curie and has been chair of governors of the Petchey Academy in Hackney, chair of trustees of the Journey of a Lifetime Trust (JoLt) and chair of governors of Orley Farm School Trust. From 2000 to 2003 she was a non-executive director of the Inland Revenue. She was a fellow of the Leadership Trust Foundation and of International Students House. She is a life fellow of the RSA. She founded the Journey of a Lifetime Trust (JoLt), the Network of Women Chairs, and Groundbreakers: Voluntary sector women leaders. 

  Dorothy was awarded the Leonard Cheshire Lifetime Achievement Award for enabling disabled people. She was nominated for the 1995 UK Woman of Europe Award for her work in the Voluntary Sector and she is an Honorary Life Member of ACEVO.

  Dorothy has a passion for travel. During her spare time, from 1983 to 2010, Dorothy organised and led month-long challenging expeditions for disabled and disadvantaged teenagers to remote corners of the world. She continues to participates in other expeditions (many of which she organises herself)  including  crossing the Bayuda  Desert by camel, and canoeing, kayaking and white-water rafting the Zambezi between Zimbabwe and Zambia. 

  Publications written by Dorothy:
  •    Financial Governance: a gentle guide for the non-financial charity trustee
  •    Good Governance: a practical guide for trustees, chairs and CEOs 
  •    Recruiting a New Chief Executive: a guide for chairs and trustees
  •    The Board’s Responsibility for Appraising the Chief Executive
  •    Good Governance: The Chair’s Role
  •    Good Governance: The Chief Executive’s Role

  www.dorothydaltongovernance.com

• Anne Moynihan

  Consultant , Anne Moynihan Consulting

  With twenty years’ experience of working in the sector, Anne was head of NCVO’s governance and leadership team until 2011 when she launched her own consultancy service, Anne Moynihan Consulting.

  She has worked extensively within Citizens Advice – from managing a CAB to being a member of the senior management team of the national organisation.

  Anne is a member of the steering group for the sector’s Code of Good Governance, a member of the Charity Law Association and was a board member of Trustees Unlimited.

   

• Lindsay Driscoll

  Lindsay Driscoll is a charity law and governance expert, currently working as a consultant at Bates Wells and Braithwaite. She was a Charity Commissioner and in 2009 was named as chair of the steering group for the Code of Good Governance and chair of the independent expert group drawing up guidance for the sector about expenses disclosure.
  
  Driscoll graduated from Oxford University with Jurisprudence, and went on to qualify as a solicitor at a City of London firm. She has over 30 years of experience in charity law and governance, including acting as assistant registrar general and lecturer at the Post-Graduate school of Law in Kenya.
  
  She spent eight years at the NCVO, latterly as head of the legal and governance department, and went on to become a partner at Sinclair Taylor and Martin, working internationally to provide technical assistance and training on NGO law.
  
  She has been a member of the executive committee of the Charity Law Association and is currently on the board of Dance United, the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law, a community foundation and a small theatre company.

Caroline Thomas

Trustee And Hon. General Secretary

Casualties Union

I now feel more confident that my charity is functioning well and have taken dozens of tips and ideas away for doing even better

Joe Curran

Resources Director

Interights

An extremely useful course with excellent materials

Liz Gould

Trustee

JWA

Every trustee should attend one of these courses if they are to do their job properly