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Who Dares Stop the Board..?
Any company worth their salt in energy and mining employ what the industry calls Stop-Work Authority. On a well-run hazardous facility, every person on site – the most senior project director, the newest contractor on their first morning, the cleaner emptying the bins in the control room – has the right to stop a job…
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(HAZOP) Guide Words for the Boardroom
The first board pack I read in earnest weighed in at just under three hundred pages. Advice I had been given on how to read board packs was sensible and useful – read the agenda first, identify the decisions, focus on the exceptions, write your questions down before the meeting. None of it answered the…
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Swiss Cheese and the Board
A few months ago, working through a risk register entry for a risk I’ll leave unnamed, I found myself counting the layers and arriving at the usual three – first-line operational control, second-line risk function review, third-line internal audit assurance – and then noticing (with a small chill) that all three layers were ultimately staffed…
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Notes to Self, Notes to Court?
Directors pride themselves on diligence – reading board papers thoroughly, making notes, and preparing for robust discussion. But the governance world continues to operate under increasing scrutiny, where every decision and document could potentially become evidence in future disputes. Annotations on board papers, while useful for personal clarity, introduce complexities that boards and directors should…
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The Ten-Year Turnover: Rethinking Board Tenure
As the landscape of prudential regulation continues to evolve, APRA’s March 2025 Governance Review Discussion Paper marks a significant step forward in strengthening governance standards across Australia’s banks, insurers, and superannuation entities. The paper’s eight proposals are designed to address perceived weaknesses in board skills, independence, performance, and – most controversially – director tenure. APRA’s…
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Governance and the Democracy Sausage
As we head towards yet another election day, my local school’s Parents and Citizens (P&C) committee is gearing up to raise funds from the legion of hungry voters descending on the school to not only make their democratic voice heard, but enjoy one of our country’s most hallowed traditions: the noble democracy sausage. I’m lucky…
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Not just an old, old wooden ship
Boardrooms are changing – slowly in some places, but noticeably. Where once director appointments were based largely on who you knew and whether you had the “right” executive background, today there seems to be a growing focus on board composition as a way to drive genuine diversity. It’s a topic I find fascinating. Over the…
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hunter2: Why Cybersecurity Shouldn’t Overwhelm Small NFP Boards
The Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) has been quite clear in its messaging lately: cybersecurity is no longer just an IT issue – it’s a Board-level governance issue. They recommend that Boards consider cybersecurity as a standing item on their agendas, not merely something to be discussed after an incident. On the surface, this…
