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Supply of information - Coggle Diagram
Supply of information
The Code states that the chair should ensure that directors receive accurate, timely and clear information
FRC guidance states
The CEO is responsible for ensuring that management fulfils its obligation to provide the board with accurate, timely and clear information
NEDs should insist on receiving high quality information and should seek clarification or amplification from management where they consider the information provided is inadequate or lacks clarity
Under the direction of the chair, the CS' reaponsibilities inched ensuring good information flowers within the board and its committee and between senior management and NEDs
All board participants have a role to play in improving the quality and timeliness of information, include the NEDs, who should demand that high standards are maintained
The CS' role in this regard will be to implement processes that enable these objectives to be achieved and to be the facilitator, promoter and guardian of high standards
Board packs
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Consists of documents or board papers that are a source information for a director prior to a board meeting
There is a correlation between the average length of board packs and the size of the organisation, rising from 125 pages for organisations with a turnover of less than £10m to over 250 pages for those with a turnover of more than £500m
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20% of respondents to a survey reported that their board packs were usually longer than 250 pages with 1% reporting board packs over 800 pages
Taking into account the average number of board meetings generally annually, large organisations are producing an average of 2,000 pages of information for board members to absorb every year
Effective board decision making is not simply a matter of getting the right people around the table, they need to address the right issues and ask the right questions and to do these things they need the right information. Identifying those issues and questions and obtaining that information presents significant challenges not only for boards and governing bodies but also for those who advise and assist
The first challenge for boards is prioritising the issues on which they spend their time. The second is determining what information is most relevant to the decision or action that the board needs to take and then finding it.
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Most boards set a target for distributing the board pack to board members of at least seven days before the meeting in order to give them time to digest its contents
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People who submit board papers on an occasional basis are hardly ever late. Those who submit papers on a regular basis are much more likely to cause problems in this regard as for them it is not a special event
If the CS is always required to wait for these papers to be submitted before distributing the board pack, the target of seven days may become increasingly unobtainable. In order to meet the target the chair has to be willing to allow papers that are ready on time to be distributed on time and order that the missing papers be distributed separately or tabled at the meeting
Other information
Boards of directors increasingly need access to other information that may not be included in board packs. For example, it is good practice to make the most of the materials included in induction packs available to all the directors
This will include documents such as the articles, previous board papers and minutes
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