Governor skills & effectiveness

Download our 20 key questions and sources of evidence to help you evaluate how effective your governing board is.

An annual governance statement is required for an academy and good practice for a maintained school. Get guidance on what yours needs to contain, and take a look at examples of statements from other schools.

Whether you're the chair of a maintained school, a trust board or an LGB, understand your role by downloading our role descriptions. Use our skills audits to help you identify your strengths and areas to work on in your role.

We summarise the key features of the competency framework for governance in just one page. Download a copy of this QuickRead as a ready-made resource to share with your board.

Understand what the competency framework for governance is and how you can use it to support training and recruitment priorities.

Follow these top tips to get off to a good start in governance and know what your board should do to support you. Find out how you can be well prepared for meetings, make a positive contribution, and overcome feeling intimidated.

Find out how an external review of governance (ERG) can help you improve your board's effectiveness, and how to commission a review. Know what to expect from the review process and how to get the most benefit from the reviewer's insights.

An action plan can demonstrate effective governance, but they're not an Ofsted requirement. Use our template and guidance to help you develop and monitor yours, and see examples from other governing boards.

Follow these steps and use our resources to carry out your self-evaluation. You'll find information on our board effectiveness tool, evaluation templates, and a dashboard for multi-academy trusts to get an overall picture across local governing bodies. Use our 360° feedback form to review your chair's performance.

Conduct appraisals to find out what your governors or trustees need to thrive in their role. Uncover training needs, plan future development and offer support in difficult areas. Use our suite of template documents to guide the process.

Get to grips with how your governing board can show its impact on school improvement. Do this by being clear on your school's objectives and using evidence such as feedback from stakeholders and governing board meeting minutes.

Use GovernorHub's effectiveness tool to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses and identify areas for development. Find a downloadable version of the tool for board members unable to complete a skills audit online.

Experienced governors give you a taste of what they've done to step up their governance and move their boards from good to great – see if they work for yours too.