Are the board structures fit for purpose?

‘We knew there were a few problems but it was a shock to find out that other parts of the group got zero stars, plunging us into supervision and losing Housing Corporation funding.’

Housing association group board member

‘Thank God for the credit crunch. For the first time the development and commercial staff and their boards are talking to housing management. Now we know what’s in the pipeline and when it needs to be let and marketed. Life has stopped being easy, so they’re trying harder.’

Senior housing association manager sees the silver lining

‘It was like being in Ashes to Ashes.’

Consultant lamenting an ALMO and council where the same people had the same arguments at the same time every day for over 20 years

Housing associations can be large, spread out and complex, so the right hand does not automatically know what the left hand is doing. Parent boards may be anxious about remote subsidiaries. By the same token these subsidiaries are not always comfortable with risks (on finance, mergers or development) taken by the centre. Associations are enticed into groups with the promise they will keep autonomy. Frustration mounts as independence is sacrificed in the name of operational efficiency. Governance reviews of troubled groups jettison surplus board members to speed up and clarify decision making.

ALMOs must ensure all geographic areas get heard at board level. Different communities do have different priorities. But these area boards or panels can get bogged down in detail and/or lose support. Sometimes old battles get re-enacted instead of grappling with the issues of today. The committee structure an ALMO starts out with evolves as it completes Decent Homes and faces new risks like trading and regeneration.

Associations and ALMOs complain of meeting so frequently that senior staff are short of time to do work on the ground. Others gather so rarely that the board members rubber-stamp executive decisions.

How do your structures measure up?

  • Do you understand the main risks and opportunities managed by all the boards and committees? What are you most worried about and what is being done about it?
  • Are all constituencies (eg, areas, tenures – tenants and leaseholders – and subsidiaries) properly represented in the structure?
  • In group structures, are the roles and responsibilities of different boards clear and fully understood? What works well about the split of roles and responsibilities and what works badly?
  • Does the structure make good use of time? Does the time spent talking in meetings squeeze out the time that should be spent doing things? (This gets dubbed constitutional constipation.) Or are meetings so infrequent that no one can remember previous debates and decisions?
  • When did the structure last get reviewed? When will this happen next? What meetings would you slash? Do any need to be added?
  • Does your constitution have any built-in weaknesses? Do subsidiaries threaten to trigger exit clauses whenever there is a disagreement? Can residents or shareholders call for extraordinary general meetings on minor matters? What is being done to sort out these glitches?
  • What is the cost of your structure? How does this compare to similar organisations? Can savings be made?

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