Effective Board Meetings

1. Your Objectives

Typically, board meetings have five objectives.

1.1 To agree a strategy and assess its effectiveness. To do this, the board must understand:

• The key 'drivers' for the business (see Key performance indicators).For example, the key driver for a manufacturing business might be product innovation. In a more mature market, it might be cost efficiency.
• The strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats that are relevant to the business (see SWOT analysis).
• The changes occurring in the industry and marketplace.

1.2 To ensure that company operations are in line with strategy.

For example, a consultancy business may be taking on numerous small projects, despite its agreed strategy of concentrating on fewer, larger projects.

1.3 To monitor financial performance against the budget.

1.4 To make sure procedural and compliance issues are properly dealt with.

These include:

• Legislation, such as the Companies Acts and health and safety law.
• Disclosure by directors of potential conflicts of interest.
• Codes of conduct (eg the rules set up by your trade association).
• Compliance with customer requirements.

1.5 To use non-executive directors as sounding boards for new ideas.

• Take full advantage of non-executives as a source of alternative approaches to problems and opportunities. (See 3.)