Board of Directors

The Role of the Board

The role of the Board is to govern the business, not manage it. Therefore, its primary responsibilities are to set overall direction of the Trust, establish boundaries and controls, recruit and motivate executives, oversee the operation of the business, and accept collective responsibility.

By setting the Trust's principles, values and standards of operation, the Board sets the tone and the boundaries of responsible business, and determines the qualities that describe business behaviour. The Board also ensures the Trust meets its obligations to stakeholders.

Once the Board has set and communicated the value and standards of the business it also needs to safeguard them by using internal control systems such as internal audit and risk assessment procedures.

Every Trust will have formal monitoring and audit systems to identify and manage risks to the business and it is important that these systems are robust and dynamic so that they provide early warning of developing issues and stakeholder expectations and perceptions of the business, as well as internal pressures that might expose the Trust to legal or reputational damage.

Ensuring that risk and audit processes are dynamic requires these systems to be reviewed so that the "right" information and quality of information is getting through to the Board - so that it can judge adherence to corporate standards and that all actual and emerging financial and non-financial risks are being addressed.

As part of this review the Board also need to be confident that the non-financial risks have been properly considered and that the information coming to them is again appropriately assured and audited.

How the board structures itself can also contribute to internal control. The use of non-executive directors aims to safeguard standards and oversee all or part of the responsible business agenda. The Board will also spread responsibility across existing committee structures.