Seven keys to running effective board committees
Don’t let your board’s size stop you from laying the groundwork for the full complement of committees.
If you’re starting, you might be too small to have all our recommended committees. You might be a committee of the whole, as we say — the whole board does the work of each committee.
Committee work is essential to the evolution from a founding board to a sustaining one.
Charter school boards generally evolve along a similar path to excellence. You’ll move from being primarily reactive towards being more strategic. And at each stage along the path, committee work is essential.
Founding board members sometimes hesitate to delegate essential board work to committees.
Even still, it’s important to understand exactly what each board committee does and what skill sets each committee needs.
That way, you’ll be able to purposefully work in the right mindset for each committee within each board meeting.
And, you’ll be on the lookout to recruit the right board members or non-board committee members to help grow your board — and your capabilities.
Every committee must have a job description and a set of measurable goals.
Annually, the board should approve a job description and a set of prioritized goals for each committee.
These two documents set the parameters for the committee’s work and confirm the full board’s buy-in to the committee’s proposed work for the year.
With a dashboard to keep goals visible, you can keep your committees — and the board as a whole — on track during every meeting.
BoardOnTrack’s goals dashboard is built to track each committee’s goals and help them fulfill them. It even allows you to assign tasks to specific trustees to ensure the work gets done.
It’s one of the ways we help keep boards focused on priorities, not personalities, and empower you to do real work together.
Committee work in between board meetings is vital.
Committee work distills the big issues and frames recommendations for the board to discuss.
Committee work is the heart and soul of any board. And substantive committee work in between board meetings is one of the keys to an effective board. Many charter school boards could be much more effective if they had active, functioning committees — and not committees in name only.
Small boards sometimes choose to do most tasks as a “committee of the whole.” This is a good strategy only for very young organizations — during the initial founding and startup years. But as you grow and your organization evolves, it is essential that you form committees, have clear committee work plans, and ensure that committees do substantive work in between meetings.
Board committees should meet as often as necessary to accomplish their work.
But, committees should only feel compelled to meet when substantive work is to be done.
For example, a Facilities Committee racing to close a deal on a new building might need to meet every week for six weeks straight. Whereas the Finance Committee might need a meeting once a month to review the monthly financials.
To the extent possible, map out your committee meetings for the year. And get them on your committee members’ calendars. Your trustees are volunteers — and very busy people. It’s much more likely they’ll come to meetings, and arrive having prepared in advance if they know about them far in advance.
If you’re unclear about how many meetings any committee will need, it’s better to pencil them all in for the year. It’s easier to cancel meetings than it is to ask busy people to schedule them at the last minute.
Each committee must keep accurate meeting minutes.
Just like for board meeting minutes, your committee meeting minutes are the record of the actions that were taken at the meeting and by whom.
When you schedule your committee meetings in BoardOnTrack, managing your committee meeting minutes is simple.
The platform automatically creates a folder for each committee meeting in the meeting archive. As you create agendas, take minutes, and share documents for each committee meeting, all of those documents are automatically placed in the correct meeting archive folder for you.
This makes it simple for your committees to function at the highest level. It allows other board members to follow the work of each committee. And it ensures that you’re creating an institutional memory of the committee’s work that can survive changing committee chairs.
Strong board committees start with skilled committee chairs.
Strong committees that do substantive work between board meetings are a key component of an effective, strategic, and sustainable board.
The committee chair is responsible for steering your committee's work throughout the year while also tying that work back in with the rest of the board.
Much like board chairs, great committee chairs have strong group processes and facilitation skills. They know how to keep strong personalities focused on the right things and how to move a group to a decision.
Each committee chair sets clear directions and norms for their committee. So, in addition to strong group facilitation skills, committee chairs must be able to:
- Hold committee members accountable
- Establish the right protocols for interacting with staff to preserve the governance-management line
- Help all committee members navigate the tricky role of working directly with C-Suite team members
Your CEO and C-Suite leaders will also have a role to play on your board’s committees.
Committees should be the engine of the board. They need direct, expert support from staff to be successful.
As the organization grows, the CEO will delegate committee liaison work to their C-suite. Staff must be assigned to and clear on their roles to support and sustain effective committee work.
Committee meeting agendas are created in partnership between the Committee Chair and the CEO or their designee {a C-suite member}.
But, in the beginning, they will be heavily involved in the committees and the board overall.
The CEO sets and achieves the management goals and supports the board in achieving them. And the board’s goals will be assigned to each committee.