Governance and trusteeship

Aspiring to good governance is about more than just navigating current challenges. A charity is best placed to achieve ambitions if it has:

• effective governance
• the right leadership structures
• skilled and committed trustees, who understand their roles and work in partnership with executive leadership.

In recent years, charity governance has shifted significantly. The move to remote or hybrid meetings, increased pressure on resources and the need to respond rapidly to a changing world have placed strain on previously robust and effective structures.

This, combined with the spotlight on trusteeship, means that the case for good governance is stronger than ever.

We have experience of reviewing, developing, and supporting governance arrangements in organisations across the sector. Whatever your budget, we can tailor our support to help you.

We can help with:

• Strengthening or reviewing governance: Regular governance reviews ensure your structures remain compliant, effective, and aligned with your mission. The Charity Governance Code recommends an external review every three years. We can assess your board, memberships, and broader structures, offering practical recommendations for improvement, including delegated decision-making and subcommittee roles, to enhance efficiency and clarity.
• Improving and reviewing composition: The right mix of skills, experience, and diversity on your board is critical to informed and effective decision-making. We can review your board’s composition and help you identify recruitment, development and training priorities, ensuring you draw members from appropriate and representative sources to strengthen impact and inclusivity.
• Fostering strong board relationships and navigating complexity: Clear roles, mutual respect, and appropriate boundaries are key to success. Whether focusing on team building, enhancing board dynamics, or facilitating challenging discussions and decisions, we can help you run productive awaydays or workshops that build trust and alignment while addressing sensitive issues constructively.
• Enhancing Governance Support Functions: Effective governance relies on robust support systems, processes and strong administrative foundations. We can provide tailored advice to improve these vital systems, ensuring your organisation’s governance is set up for success.

Independent governance review

Regular reviews provide:

• a clear and independent evaluation of your governance arrangements
• a pathway for improvement
• evidence of your commitment to good governance.

We typically offer reviews using the Charity Governance Code (the Code) as our framework for evaluation and utilise our specially developed Governance Wheel as our central diagnostic.

We’re committed to producing clear, prioritised recommendations which support the principles set out in the Code.

We can also tailor our process to adhere to sector-specific codes such as education and social housing.

Governance assessments board appraisals, and individual trustee reviews:

We will often support organisations with a more focused or lighter touch reviews, examining the performance of the board, a subcommittee or subsidiary entity. We can work with you and adapt our approaches to ensure we give meaningful recommendations with limited time.

The Charity Governance Code encourages larger charities to review the contributions of individual trustees on a regular basis. We can support with facilitating this exercise, drawing out wider themes and lessons for the board and establishing personal development plans for board members.

Composition, skills, and diversity audits: 

We regularly support organisations to review the makeup of the boards or subcommittees. This can be done as part of a governance review or separately. The exercises are intended to identify what skills and experience trustees bring, and the gaps in skills and diversity on your board. We can then help you to decide where to focus recruitment, training, or paid advice.

We also know that the inequalities in society are often replicated in boards and governance structures. Auditing a board’s diversity can allows organisations to develop plans which address barriers to participation and monitor progress against diversity objectives.

Facilitated discussions: 

We are passionate about supporting boards to make good decisions and we know that some discussions benefit from structured external facilitation.

Our skilled and experienced facilitators can help your board give focus to key issues, frame tricky questions and reflect on performance and learning. We can provide an external and independent input to help shape your discussion.

Board and senior team dynamics:

The dynamic between a board and the senior team is at the heart of effective decision-making and organisational success. Strong, collaborative relationships require clarity, trust, and ongoing investment.

We help charities define clear parameters for roles and responsibilities, establish shared expectations, and cultivate a positive culture of mutual support and constructive challenge. By fostering these foundations, we ensure your leadership operates cohesively to drive impact.

Advice and governance development: 

Whether it is a new induction process for trustees, a revised scheme of delegation or a reworking of committee terms of reference, we are happy to provide extra capacity to your team in making practical changes.

Mentoring and coaching: 

Our consultants have experience as board members, chairs and professional governance roles. We regularly provide structured mentoring or coaching support to trustees and chairs who are new to their role or navigating challenging situations.

Training:

We have a well-established programme of training topics on governance. These are run as an open programme or specifically for your charity.

If you have an issue that you think we may be able to help with, please get in touch.

Complete our enquiry form or email consultancy@ncvo.org.uk.