Why is measuring board skills and experience important?
Catching flaws early on helps prevent bigger problems later
Regularly reviewing your board’s effectiveness means that you can quickly flag where things aren’t working as they should, or where there are weaknesses in your oversight. You’ll be able to take action before there’s a chance your board will miss something important in terms of safeguarding, wellbeing or performance.
Effective governance can sometimes feel like an insurmountable challenge, with boards responsible for so much important oversight. It’s important to remember that effective governance is the sum of many basic tasks and duties, and doing these smaller tasks well matters. Identifying manageable tasks and steps by reviewing your effectiveness means great governance doesn’t need to feel overwhelming.
Get more out of the skills already on your board, and spot gaps to fill
As a board, you'll want to make sure that you have the skills and knowledge you need and that you're recruiting wisely to fill any gaps. The best boards contain people from a diverse range of backgrounds and with different skills, so everyone can bring something different to the board.
You might also have people on the board who have skills or experiences that you're unaware of and you'll want to make the most of these.
By keeping a record of how your board has grown its skills, you've also got the evidence ready for any board evaluations, external reviews of governance or Ofsted visits.
You should complete a skills audit annually, and get new governors/trustees to complete it when they join.
Tip: to help you get a good response rate, prompt your board to complete the GovernorHub board effectiveness tool at the same time as you send them key documents that must be reviewed annually (e.g. declarations of interest and the code of conduct).
GovernorHub's online tool goes above and beyond a skills audit
GovernorHub's new board effectiveness tool collates all your board members' skills, experience and knowledge in one place.
Our effectiveness tool collates information from each governor/trustee to help you and your board:
- Evaluate strengths and weaknesses in different areas
- Identify development and training needs
- Identify board members with experience in specific tasks, e.g. exclusion panels
You can find the tool by going to your board's page on GovernorHub, selecting 'Governing Board' and then 'Effectiveness'. Find out more in our help articles on GovernorHub.
Measuring strengths and weaknesses
We've carefully chosen some statements that we refer to as 'efficacies' – these are designed to be useful for all governing and trust boards and collect information on individuals' strengths and weaknesses in the following areas (see examples of the statements in each area below):
- Committing
- 'I actively engage in training for my role'
- Contributing
- 'I feel respected and safe enough to voice my opinions in meetings'
- Leading
- 'I can recognise if I'm becoming too operational and adjust accordingly'
- Aspiring
- 'I fully understand our vision, values and ethos'
- Evaluating
- 'I know the strengths and weaknesses of my board'
- Analysing/monitoring
- 'I know how to determine whether my school/trust is compliant'
For each statement, you need to select to what extent you agree/disagree, as shown in this image:
Identifying development and training needs
In the next section you can indicate which areas of governance you have experience in, which you feel confident with, and where you would like to receive further training. Your board admin can collate this information and help to co-ordinate training for the board.
For example:
- If the majority of the board indicated that they would like training in data analysis, you could arrange a group training session as part of a board meeting
- If a board member feels confident in handling suspensions and exclusions, they may be called upon to chair the panel when needed
Collating skills brought to the board
The board effectiveness tool also has a section for you to input all the experience you're bringing to the board from other life experiences. For example, if you have experience in balancing budgets at work, you might be best placed to help scrutinise the school budget on the finance committee.
Governors/trustees often have a lot of skills and experience that the board is unaware of, so this section helps to identify any missed opportunities as well as areas to focus on when recruiting new board members.
Bringing the board's skills and knowledge together
Your board's admin will be able to see a visualisation of the data to analyse what strengths and weaknesses the board as a whole has.
Our user guide for admins on GovernorHub gives you all the information you need to interpret the data and use it effectively.
Use our downloadable version if needed
If a member of your board is unable to complete the effectiveness tool on Governorhub, give them the downloadable version below. Your board admin can then put their answers into the tool.