TakeControl Solutions Services

Services

TakeControl Solutions are experienced and skilled in the following areas and are able to deliver standard or customised training and project work to improved the effectiveness of your NFP organisation through increasing the skills, knowlege, capacity and processes of your Board.

Please contact me to discuss how we, together, can best meet your Boards needs and how we can best improvide the effectiveness, efficiency and service delivery of your organisation through effective Board leadership.

Board Governance

Good governance is about the processes for making and implementing decisions. It’s not about making ‘correct’ decisions, but about the best possible process for making those decisions.

Good decision-making processes, and therefore good governance, share several characteristics - accountability, transparency, legal, responsive, equitable, inclusive, effective, efficient and participatory.

The ACNC's Governance Standards must be met for an organisation to retain their "charity" status, however I advise these are the "absolute minimum" standards any NFP should meet.

How can the governance of your organisation be improved?

Board/CEO Relationship

While relationships between all stakeholders in an organisation are essential to the overall effectiveness of an organisation, the relationship between the CEO and the Board is the most crucial, and the state of this relationship has potentially the greatest influence on organisations success.

For this relationship to work well, it must be one of negotiation, consideration, communication and understanding of the role and perspective of the other. There must also be a recognition that the CEO and the Board play separate and distinct roles, but must work together in order to achieve the organisations Vision, Mission and Strategic Plan.

Is the relationship between the Board and CEO in your organisation functioning as it should and as healthy as it could be?

Board Reporting - Board Packs

Deloite Australia have said "Governance expectations of Directors in the NFP sector continue to be in the spot light following the release of the ACNC’s new governance framework. As a result there is an increasing need for Directors to consider whether the Board Reports they receive provide the necessary information to enable them to properly fulfil their obligations."

All reporting to Board must be timely, be accurate, build trust, inform about the organisation strategy, deliver adequate detail but not bog reports down, be visually easy to read and be provided in a form suitable for the level of the reader.

Are your Board reports helping you make informed decisions based on your ogranisations Strategic Direction?

Strategic Planning

Every organisation should have a clearly defined Mission, Vision and set of Core Values which define the ultimate purpose of an organisation. The short, medium and long term specifics of how that will be achieved make up the Strategic Plan.

A Strategic Plan MUST be fully documented and communicated throughout the organisation, enabling all stakeholders to know what the organisation is working toward.

The CEO must be empowered to deliver on the Strategic Plan and kept accountable by specific KPI's.

Do all your stakeholder know what your Strategic Plan is?

Change Management

When your organization undertakes projects or initiatives to improve performance, seize opportunities, address key issues and change strategy, they will require changes to processes, job roles, organizational structures, culture and technology. At the end of the day it is actually the employees of your organization who have to ultimately change in how they do their jobs. If these individuals are unable to transitions, or are even resistant to chagne, then the initiatives will not be as effective as they could be. If employees embrace and adopt the changes required by the initiatives they will deliver the expected results.

Change can be managed to ensure effective implementation of initiatives.

How successful have past major changes been in your organisation?

Policy Development

Written policies are required within an organisation to:

Put strategy into action
Set limits on actions
Allow and reward behaviour
State what staff can expect
Reduce unreliable decision making
Set out who can make decisions; and
Help acheive good governance.

While the Board should be aware of all policies impacting an organisation there are subsets to which they should be directly involved in writing.

What are your Board policies? Do you have a Board handbook?

Vision/Mission/Core Values

Your mission statement is a declaration of an organization’s core purpose. A mission statement answers the question, “why do we exist?”

A vision statement is a declaration of where you are headed – your future state. I like the analogy of your vision is “knowing what mountain you’re climbing,” and your mission as “how you’re going to get there.”

NFP's are not heartless, money hungry institutions - they reflect a set of beliefs that define why the organisation does what it does. Your core values should explain what you stand for and what you believe in.

Do you have a clearly defined Vision, Mision and Core Values? Are they clearly articulated to ALL stakeholders?

Compliance

Every organisation must comply with, amongst other things, the prohibitions under criminal law, OH&S Legislation, Anti-Discrimination Legislation, Financial Probity, Tax Legislation and Privacy Legislation.

In addition to this NFP's must also comply with the requirements of the Incorporations Act (as it applies in your state), fundraising requirements (as they apply in your state), the requirements of your Tax Office status (e.g. PBI or Charity) and the requirements placed on an organisation by the ACNC.

Your organisations Board is ultimately responsible in ensuring all this compliance is met fully and on time.

Are you 100% confident your organisation is fully compliant?

Project Work and Programs

I can work with your organisations Board over a period of time to implement long term Board and Governance development and capacity growth within your organisation. This can be done purely as training programs or working alongside the Board, CEO and Senior Staff to develop Governance, Policies, Board Reports etc that will enable your organisation to reach new heights.

Through meetings, surveys and discussions I can also conduct Board audits, identify strengths and weaknesses, and deliver training programs tailored to meet your needs.