Here at Convene, we are meeting experts, so we decided to set out a helpful guide to cover the essential meeting questions:

Yesterday, Tuesday 10th May, Convene visited Dublin Castle to attend the Chartered Governance Institute’s Governance Ireland Conference. Having recently attended CGI’s ESG Summit, we were excited to take advantage of this new opportunity to connect with peers and colleagues on the future of governance.

For many companies, a Governance Manager is a useful role when it comes to maintaining compliance. Although it is not essential, the responsibilities of the Governance Manager must be fulfilled by someone in the organisation.

Project governance is regularly confused with the term project management but they are in fact two separate concepts. Project governance centres around the strategic decisions that allow for a successful project whereas project management deals with the day-to-day decision making.

Your senior executive team is at the heart of your organisation. They make the day-to-day decisions that decide the fate of the company. Unfortunately, sometimes they are not up to scratch. 

A skills audit is a review of the skills and knowledge your employees have. It allows you to see the gaps in their expertise, and understand the areas you need to improve.

What Does the 2021 IPCC Report Mean for Businesses?

No matter how well your directors work together, sometimes there are things they cannot do. In this case, you might want to get another person involved to help resolve a single issue. However, this doesn’t mean you want to give that person all the responsibilities of a Board member! 

A Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is the leader and public face of an organisation. They are the highest position of authority in the chain of command, but are held accountable by the Board of Directors. The role of a CEO in a non-profit is more varied and differs slightly from the standard CEO of a company.

The importance of strategy should never be underestimated. It decides which companies succeed, and which companies fail. Even if you have the greatest service in the world, it means nothing without a good strategy.

“Good governance” is a term that has been thrown around so often in the past 20 years that it has almost become interchangeable with the word governance itself. However, you may still be unclear on what exactly this means.

A Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is a way of measuring whether your organisation is meeting its goals. It is a quantifiable figure that tells you about your progress over time.

A KPI is more specific than general performance metrics. It assesses the most important targets of your business, and shows your team where their priorities should be. Your company likely already collects data, so selecting KPIs is about choosing the metrics that support your strategic goals.

When it comes to incident management, there are a number of different KPIs you can track. They can tell you how well your team is reacting to issues, and the things you can do to improve.

When it comes to business, the board should always speak with one voice. However, your board members are still human. Not everyone can agree all of the time. Whatever the size of your board, there may be times when you wish it was one member smaller. 

Whether you’re new to the boardroom or a seasoned professional, it can never hurt to brush up on the basics! Business is tough at the best of times. Don’t let the big decisions distract you from the essentials. Once you understand the simple things, the rest will come naturally.