In the UK, Snickers bars used to be called Marathons and this is what the March Board of Trustees (BOT) meeting turned out to be for some of us. March is one of the three days when the main boards and Council meet before the BOT so for yours truly and a lot of others the day starts at 1000 and finishes at about 1930 for a much-needed dinner.
The format of the day is that the main board meetings, whose members are also Council members, start at 1000 and continue until 1445 allowing a 15-minute break before the formal, full Council meeting which starts at 1500. The Trustees leave at 1700 to go to the BOT meeting until 1930 when dinner is served. Council continues with a feedback session and a networking dinner.
At the March meeting, all of the main boards are looking to consider what amendments need to be suggested for the IET Strategy ahead of the June Strategy meeting. The VEB is no exception and we spent a very fruitful discussion looking at whether volunteers were fully represented within the strategy document. Our deliberations will be finalised ahead of the June meeting, where the IET Strategy will be agreed. At the VEB, we try to arrange the agenda so that for one item everyone gets a chance to get up and walk around via the use of a structured discussion and 3 flip chart locations for the discussion topics, but alas this was not to be this time so it was a rather sedentary meeting. A blog about the meeting, from Joe Dunn, can be found here.
A ”quick” dash up two flights of stairs from the Wedmore board room to Riverside dining room for the full Council meeting via the tea and coffee watering hole ensued. A key part of the Council meeting is the three board Chairs providing a brief to Council about significant items discussed during their meetings enabling some very useful cross fertilisation of ideas. This assists Council in hearing what the other boards have talked about and strengthens their involvement at the heart of the IET action. There is also time for Council to discuss things of concern to the whole Council including helping with the development of the IET’s overall Strategy. This was done in a café session when the Council breaks into groups to discuss topics of interest before reporting back to the full Council.
At 1700, the Trustees made a hasty exit and "sprinted" down two flights of stairs to the Wedmore boardroom for the BOT meeting leaving just enough time to get some more coffee to keep us going. Then we were straight into another full agenda where major topics of discussion included the safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults which Charities are encouraged to review and discuss in the light of the recent disclosures. At the meeting it was confirmed that this is one of the volunteer policies that the IET has and there is also video training for those volunteers whose roles include working with these groups. Other topics included the signing off of the Annual Report and Financial accounts ahead of the Annual Members Information Event to be held on 17 May 2018.
