Charity Governance Reviews

As a trustee or someone who works closely with a charity board you understand the critical importance of good charity governance.

Your beneficiaries, funders, staff, regulator and other key stakeholders including the general public expect and demand very high standards.

It’s all about providing reassurance that your charity is properly managing the resources entrusted to it. And that you are using them effectively for your charitable purposes.

You will also be very aware that the Charity Regulator has extensive powers to investigate when something goes wrong. This includes the power to investigate trustee actions (or inactions) and using their enforcement powers to address any problems.

But how do you know that your governance arrangements are strong enough?

When did your board last step back and complete a comprehensive governance review against the Charity Governance Code Principles?

Best practice says you should undertake regular governance reviews – at least annually, with an external review every 3 years for larger charities.

Some charity boards rely on more general reassurances about their governance such as a healthy bank balance and sufficient reserves. Others rely on no issues raised by the auditors; a governance “expert” on the board who says everything is fine; a CEO who says that he/she has everything under control.

These types of reassurances are positive indicators about your governance but they may not be enough. They don’t necessarily cover all the standards required by the Charity Governance Code Principles such as:

1. Delegated Authority and Matters Reserved for the Board
2. Conflicts of Interest and Code of Conduct for board members
3. Financial Systems and Controls
4. Risk Policy, Register, Procedures and Management
5. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

Charity governance reviews are essential to satisfy your board and key stakeholders that your governance arrangements meet the standards required.

The question is, how do you go about this?

We offer a unique and innovative solution to completing a charity governance review – the Charity Governance Tool.

It’s online and enables your board to benchmark itself effectively and comprehensively against the Charity Governance Code Principles.

Watch our short explainer video on how to complete your Charity Governance Review quickly and effectively.

Here are just some of the benefits of using the Governance Tool to complete your Charity Governance Review:

• Meet key governance requirements – so you can “Comply or Explain” your organisation’s adherence to important Charity Governance Code Principles
• Easy for the board to understand and follow – so no need to be a governance “expert"
• Generate clear governance outputs – the SMART Governance Action Plan is clearly laid out so that it matches the Charity Governance Code Principles
• Improve the effectiveness of your board – better governance leads to more effective results and outcomes
• Save your organisation money – a one-off fixed price (with no hidden subscription fees) means you can save £’000s on specialist consultants
• Save you time and resources – as the online tool is interactive, this means no cumbersome paper checklists and then writing up the report and agreeing the actions with everyone

Complete your Governance Review in 5 easy steps using our online tool:

1. Organise a board or a sub-committee meeting (face to face or online)

2. At the meeting, share the Charity Governance Tool questionnaire screen and answer the questions in all seven sections

3. Generate your Report and SMART Action Plan

4. Name and save your Report and SMART Action Plan

5. Complete the SMART Action Plan with responsibilities, priorities and timeframes and provide clear evidence where you meet the standards

And now you’re ready to implement the agreed actions to improve your charity’s governance arrangements!

If you would want a quick look at how the Charity Governance Tool works, try our Free Preview version. This provides full access to one of seven sections so you can see how easy the tool is to use. With no need to commit any payment details.

The Free Preview will show you how the tool is structured that makes it easy to use.

When you want to access the full version, that’s easy to do when you’re ready.

“We were very pleased to have the opportunity to use the online Charity Governance Tool to review our charity’s governance arrangements.

Working with my Chair I found the process simple and informative and the results were very helpful in assisting us examine and enhance our governance practices and performance. I would recommend the Charity Governance Tool to any CEO and Board interested in working together to renew and refresh your charity’s governance."

Charity CEO

As a Board, we undertook the Charity Governance Tool with the guidance of Tony Haren. The tool proved to be comprehensive and searching, even challenging! Board members were surprised by the scope of the tool and found the process extremely useful. We were pleased to discover that many of our practices were good, however some fell short of best practice.  

We subsequently reviewed the outcomes of the governance assessment and Action Plan internally and committed to change in various areas. 

I would fully endorse the value of the Admor Charity Governance Tool for charitable organisations of any size and would recommend it as a key tool in achieving excellent governance standards."

Charity Chair

We recognise that not all charities are the same size. Many smaller charities don’t have any staff and turnover is usually below £100,000 or equivalent.

Any size of charity can use our Charity Governance Tool, just choose the responses relevant to your size and your organisation.

(And if you aren’t VAT registered, we pay the VAT for you!).

If you want to check it out first, then try our Free Preview here.

For more details about how you can make your charity governance reviews more effective Contact us here.

Your guarantee

Remember, we offer a 100%, no quibble money back guarantee if you’re not satisfied at any time. We will send you a refund straight back to your bank account. Even if you’ve used the tool as many times as you want – we’re that confident that it will add value to your organisation.