International Policy Governance Association (IPGA)

Conferences

2010 Agenda

Click here for workshop descriptions.

Wednesday July 21, 2010

8:00am IPGA Board Meeting

Thursday July 22, 2010

8:00am-9:00am Continental Breakfast

9:00am UKPGA Board Meeting

9:00am PreConference Workshop:

Policy Governance® Fundamentals

Leveraging Your Board’s Excellence and Impact:

The Model and Its Applications

Presented by Karen Fryday-Field

10:45am Break

11:00am PreConference Workshop Resumes

12:30pm Lunch Together

1:00pm Joint IPGA and UKPGA Board Meeting

1:30pm PreConference Workshop Resumes

3:00pm Break

3:15pm PreConference Workshop Resumes

4:30pm PreConference Workshop Concludes

5:00pm-6:30pm IPGA Annual General Meeting

7:30pm-9:00pm Welcome Reception

Mingle with the Authoritative Source: Dr. and Mrs. Carver,

The IPGA Board, Stephen Haines and attendees from

around the world.

Friday July 23, 2010

7:00am-8:00am Continental Breakfast

7:30am Conference Registration and Conference Bookstore Open

8:00am General Session Begins

Welcome from IPGA CEO and IPGA Board

Welcome from Conference Chair: Karen Fryday-Field

8:15am Plenary Session

Presented by members of the Clark County School Board

9:15am Keynote Speaker Stephen Haines

Effective Governing: The Systems Thinking Approach (TM)

10:30am Break

10:45am Workshop Series A Begins (click for descriptions)

Concurrent Sessions

12:15pm Workshop Series A Concludes

12:30pm Networking Luncheon

1:45pm Workshop Series B Begins (click for descriptions)

Concurrent Sessions

2:30pm Break

2:45pm Workshop Series B Resumes

3:30pm Workshop Series B Concludes

6:00pm Optional Group Outings (to be announced)

Saturday July 24, 2010

7:00am-8:00am Continental Breakfast

7:30am Conference Registration and Conference Bookstore Open

8:30am Plenary Session: Young Governors Speak

This will be a facilitated panel discussion with powerpoint

back-up focusing on four young people working with

boards in California, USA, Ontario, Canada, The Hague,

Netherlands and Chiang Mai, Thailand.

10:00am Break

10:45am Workshop Series C Begins (click for descriptions)

Concurrent Sessions

12:15pm Workshop Series C Concludes

12:30pm Lunch On Own

Board/Sponsor Luncheon

1:45pm Workshop Series D Begins (click for descriptions)

Concurrent Sessions

2:30pm Break

2:45pm Workshop Series D Resumes

3:30pm Workshop Series D Concludes

7:00pm-12:00am Closing Reception

Workshop Descriptions

Session A (Friday morning)

Focusing on Purpose: The Power of Ends (Part A)

Bill Charney and Jim Hyatt

Participants will understand what Ends policies are; how they differ from traditional mission and goals/objectives language; examples of how to write Ends policies from broadest to more specific policy levels; how to apply the "what worth" component to the global statement.

Ends Interpretation and Strategic Planning in a Systems Age

Susan Radwan

CEOs often find it difficult to interpret Board's ends in a comprehensive and systemic way. This workshop will offer a process to think through all the operational pieces in a coherent and dynamic way and develop a written plan that will drive operational performance and serve a purpose in delivering dynamic and innovative Ends interpretations and monitoring reports.

Crisis Governance

Caroline Oliver and Stuart Emslie

Crisis management has become a discipline to itself - but what about crisis governance? Using real examples from organizations faced with crises, this workshop will examine the board's role in dealing with crises from a Policy Governance perspective. Participants are invited to bring their own examples to contribute to the discussion.

How to Develop Quantitative Metrics for Subjective and Intangible Ends and Display the Data to Achieve Effective and High Impact Monitoring for Better Board Strategic Decision Making

Richard Biery

There is a nexus of opportunity between the requirement in Policy Governance to monitor ends and the general growing emphasis (and even insistence by funders) on measurement of results in NPs and ministries, even subjective ends. More and more boards (and donors and funders) are insisting that Ends monitoring be stepped up in quality and rigor, including the use of quantified outcome (ends) measures. The chief executive of a NFP or a ministry may feel profoundly out of his or her element to achieve the more quantitative thinking about ends being expected. However, Ends metrics, when accomplished well, have profound, even transformational, effects on alignment, energy, and enable deeper knowledge of what the organization is about, leading to better and better strategy and standout long term performance. Good ends metrics profoundly empower both board & management.

This workshop is designed to help the attendee think through the development of ends monitoring, particularly when the ends appear to be subjective or intangible. The challenge for management is not only one of creating the Reasonable Interpretations, but what convincing supporting evidence can be developed and effectively presented, especially of a metric nature, for a subjective or an intangible end? We will explore with the attendees inventive ways of developing quantitative indicators, share some approaches, talk about what the measurement literature is offering, and share examples. Once, achieving ends quantitative measures, even fairly crude ones, other advantages occur, such as enabling critical thinking about effectiveness and efficiency. Once metrics are available, graphical means of presentation can be developed. The workshop will also explore various means of visualizing data that enhance the board’s (and management’s) ability to grasp the implications of the data. This was a well received seminar last year and the need, relevance, and interest remain high. This seminar has been updated with additional examples. This workshop is best suited to those responsible for developing the monitoring reports and for CEOs and board members seeking to understand what is possible to expect in ends monitoring and the transformational effect it can have.

The Agenda Building Mystery: Developing Perpetual, Annual, and Meeting Agendas

Eric Craymer

Policy Governance® writing includes three different agendas; the perpetual, the annual and the meeting agenda. This can be very confusing. In reality all three are extremely related and, when their proper place and function are understood, creating meeting agendas becomes a much simpler task.

Participants may expect to walk away with the following:

An understanding of how the three agendas are inter-related and fit together.
Understanding what the Perpetual Agenda is about and how it influences meetings.
Knowing how to develop an Annual Agenda.
Knowing how the Annual Agenda and Perpetual Agenda largely set the framework for the Meeting Agenda.
Suggestions for enhancing the design of their meeting agenda.
Having a logical process for developing meeting agendas.
Having a chance to practice what they have learned by developing an Annual Agenda and a Meeting Agenda with the other attendees

Session B (Friday afternoon)

Focusing on Purpose: The Power of Ends (Part B)

Bill Charney and Jim Hyatt

Leadership in the Pipeline: Board Succession Planning

Susan Radwan

Both elected and appointed boards need to think about how to maintain quality board membership that will allow the organization sustain its practice of Policy Governance which opens the door to operational innovation and functioning at high-performance levels. Traditional recruitment by a nominating committee will not likely achieve the long term result of a pipeline for leadership talent. In this workshop, the presenter will describe how a pipeline system for recruiting and developing leadership talent would be structured and how it would function.

Creating a Deliberate Board Culture

Sandy Kolberg, Kathleen Barclay, Caroline Oliver

What is your board's current culture? Are there some cultures that are incompatible with the use of Policy Governance principles and practice? Can board culture be deliberately shaped to support the introduction and maintenance of the Policy Governance approach? This workshop will give you the opportunity to explore these questions in relation to your board and consider a variety of ideas for transforming your board's culture. Participants will be given the– suggested but optional - opportunity to complete their personal Core Values Index (CVI) in advance of the workshop via a weblink.

Monitoring: Practical Approaches to Accountable Freedom

Jannice Moore and Richard Stringham

Monitoring provides a powerful mechanism for the board to provide freedom to the CEO while still maintaining accountability. This advanced session on monitoring will feature the opportunity to do “hands-on” assessment of monitoring reports. What should boards look for (and what should CEO’s include) in a monitoring report so that the board has confidence its policies have been met? When and how should a board use external monitoring, and direct inspection? What if a board wants to go beyond “compliance” to say a CEO’s performance is “excellent”? What if the board wants to use performance-based pay? These questions – and others you may have – will be discussed.

Implementing PG-One Step at a Time

Marion Thomson Howell and Judy Nairn

Working with the 10 Principles of Policy Governance, this workshop will describe the historical experience of the Waterloo Catholic District School Board and share the learning gained through a multi year process of implementation. The challenges of applying PG theory in an imperfect but real board experience will be highlighted along with practical implementation strategies.

Evolution of Monitoring Reports

Caroline Oliver and John Bruce

Having good monitoring reports is an enormously important aspect of Policy Governance and one of the most challenging. This workshop will help deepen your understanding of monitoring through studying the evolution of monitoring reports in two organizations - a hospital run by a UK National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust and the UK Policy Governance Association.

Session C (Saturday morning)

Policy Governance and the New CEO

Jim Hyatt

When an organization needs to hire a new CEO, chances are he or she will not be familiar with Policy Governance. This makes the recruitment process more difficult for a board: How can it determine in advance whether a prospective CEO is "right" for working within the Policy Governance framework? This workshop will provide participants with the tools and knowledge to construct a sound process for identifying characteristics, screening and interviewing candidates, and orienting the new hire to the PG system.

Setting Standards for Fiscal Oversight

Bill Charney

One of the least understood aspects of Policy Governance is how it enhances fiscal oversight, in contrast to traditional board approaches, in which "budget approval" is greatly overestimated as a governance tool. How can boards effectively set standards for multiple layers of fiscal concerns, such as budgeting, actual financial condition/activities, protection of financial/physical/brand assets, and compensation and benefits?

Participants gain a clearer understanding of:

How to establish clear governing policies for financial issues.
The importance of assessing financial performance against board-established criteria.
Actual examples of governing policies for budgeting, financial condition and activities,compensation and benefits, and asset protection

CEO Monitoring from Both Sides of the Mirror: CEO and Board Perspectives in Interaction

Eric Craymer and Susan Radwan

CEO monitoring is a key to so much in Policy Governance®; accountability, clarity, authority, evaluation, and improvement. Commonly each side of this integrated system, the board and the CEO, learns their own part without considering what is happening on the other side. Because the process itself is about exchange of information and feedback, only thinking about it from your own side can lead to surprises, doubts, a lack of clear direction in how to proceed, and sometimes out and out conflict.

In this workshop we will look at the internal monitoring process from both the board and the CEO perspectives. Each of them has a unique role to play and can best complete their unique job if they understand what goes on behind the closed door of the other. By understanding what the other party is doing and why, you will be able to build your ability to do your own job in a way that will make more sense to, and interact with, the other side of the system.

The two facilitators will each represent one of the two perspectives and illustrate the back and forth of information exchange and feedback. They will also illustrate some of the dysfunctions that can occur if either or both of the two sides of the system only understands monitoring from their own perspective.

Future-Focused Agendas: Maximizing the Potential of Your Board's Time

Jannice Moore

Policy Governance positions a board to maximize the use of its valuable time by providing future-focused leadership to an organization. Unfortunately, some boards begin the Policy Governance journey, develop policies, do routine review of policies, do routine monitoring, but in terms of providing future leadership, more or less carry on doing "business as usual, just a little differently." Other boards become fixated on the process of using the model. Or they become complacent, thinking "we have policies, we monitor them, we're doing our job." They miss the opportunity that the model presents to move to a whole new level of engagement. They miss the chance to be truly proactive and provide future-focused leadership. In this session we will explore practical methods of designing and using "future-focused agendas" through which the board can set the course for an organization that is healthy and viable not just today and tomorrow, but for the long-term future. The session will include some interactive opportunity for participants to share their ideas, as well as practical tools and tips to try with your board.

Using Systems Thinking to Boost Ends Achievement

Karl Sommers

This workshop is an introduction to Systems Thinking: a higher order of thinking about the whole system first rather than its parts. How we think determines how we plan, which determines how we act – and that determines the results we get in work and life. This workshop will cover three main points as follows:

1. The Science of Systems Thinking: The natural way the world works.

Participants will learn how to apply the simple framework for systems thinking including the following components:

Inputs — Throughputs — Outputs — Feedback — Environment

2. Policy Governance viewed within the Systems Thinking framework.

Participants will play the role of a board of directors. They will map the components of their governance system into the Systems Thinking framework by learning where to place the five key Thinking Systems questions:

a. Where do we want to be?

b. How will we know when we get there?

c. Where are we now?

d. How do we get there?

e. What may change in the future environment?

3. Using the Systems Thinking framework to enable major organizational change.

Participants will play the role of CEO and Senior Management. The board has just made a significant change in the Ends Policies for your organization. In addition, your organization is beginning to experience a financial crisis brought on by reduced sales of products & services and a reduction in donor funding. As a CEO/Management Team, how would you address these leadership challenges using the Systems Thinking framework to give you the greatest opportunity to succeed?

Session D (Saturday afternoon)

Board Dialog: Achieving One Voice through the Mutual Learning Model

Eric Craymer

As with many Policy Governance concepts, speaking with one voice is relatively simple to understand but not necessarily easy to do. Hidden agendas, a fear of conflict, concern for revealing your level of understanding of the model, and a desire to maintain group cohesionstay can all stand in the way. This consultant believes that the one voice is as much about boards having the ability to reach a single position in a process that allows each board member to feel included as it is about supporting the final decision once made.

Experience suggests that many boards struggle with this. They thoroughly believe in speaking with one voice but are not sure how to do it. They often fall back on familiar board room behaviors which can undermine shared learning, group wisdom, and decision ownership.

The Mutual Learning Model, as taught by Roger Schwarz of Schwarz and Associates, offers a principles based model for group interaction that can lift you above these challenges. This workshop will provide an overview of the model, how it works and how it may be used to create the board's one voice.

What You Don't Know Will Hurt You: The Legal and Fiduciary Duties of Board Members

Jim Hyatt

Using ppt, participants gain a concise understanding of the Duty of Care, its constituent elements, Duty of Loyalty, Business Judgment Rule, Good Faith Reliance, sound board practices and the integration of PG with the fulfillment of their legal duties.

Responding to the Changing Expectations reflected in Form 990 and Auditing Standards within a PG Context

Richard Biery and Gregg Capin

Both the IRS Form 990 and the recent accounting standards concerning governance are hot (and required) topics for boards. This workshop is designed, first, to familiarize the attendee with both the relatively new IRS Form 990 and especially its governance prespective, and the auditing standards that have been driven by a Sarbanes Oxley-like policy environment applied to nonprofit organizations by the Auditing Standards Board of the AICPA and the standards it has promulgated for certified auditors. These standards are extensive, and, if applied wrongly by an auditor, appear to drive the board (or its audit committee) into micromanaging the organization’s internal control environment to assure that the board is adequately knowledgeable and “accountable” to assure compliance. The presenters (Biery and Capin) have been studying these standards and their application within a Policy Governance framework for over a year and will share their thinking and suggestions. Secondly, the workshop will provide how the auditing standards can be met within a Policy Governance context and not violate its principles. Gregg Capin is a senior partner in a major accounting firm serving the nonprofit and ministry community. Thirdly, the IRS form 990 govenance questions tie back to "good governance" expectations of the IRS based on Congressional and advisory committee work over the prior 2 years. They are compatible with w/ PG, but a board should understand their expectations and know what policies to invoke. (This session was extremely popular in 2008, but was limited to audit standards. It received excellent reviews and is being updated and offered as a repeat with the 990 information added..) We will provided suggested policies and illustrate acceptable monitoring reports. We will also make the IRS background material available.

Using A Strategic Radar Screen as an Ownership Linkage Tool

Susan Radwan

A key function of a strategic board is to identify and explore the tension caused by a strategic issue (the interaction between two variables that are affecting each other in ways that demand your attention). This workshop will demonstrate a tool and process that focuses ownership linkage and board process on strategic issues where owners are the source of the issues that compete for a position on the board's radar screen.

Cultural Factors in Implementing Policy Governance-the Southern First Nations Network of Care Experience

Wendy Whitecloud, Wayne Helgason, Ralph Sutherland

This workshop explores challenges and solutions in implementing Policy Governance in the context of culturally diverse Indigenous communities.

For as long as Indigenous peoples have gathered in groups to collectively make decisions and accomplish objectives there has been governance. In introducing Policy Governance, consultants have to be sensitive to historical factors that have negatively impacted Indigenous cultures, their people and their governance systems. In today’s world, the contention is that the Policy Governance model offers Indigenous people an opportunity for effective board governance in their community agencies. At the same time, it is clear that any introduction and implementation of the model has to be sensitive to the historical and cultural context. The challenge is to ensure that the board governance system continues to reflect community norms, values, culture and language while remaining true to the principles of Policy Governance.

The presenters, from Manitoba, Canada, will share their experience about the challenges faced in implementing the model in their community agencies. As well there will be a discussion on lessons learned and some do’s and don’ts when introducing policy governance.

Practicing Good Governance: Using Your Policies as the Board Team's Playbook

Bill Charney

In this highly interactive workshop, participants will serve on "mock boards" and see how PG theory is easily put into practice. Using the "board rehearsal worksheet" from The Board Member's Playbook (authored by Miriam Carver and Bill Charney) as a primary tool, participants will be given scenarios, or hypothetical challenges, and will be asked to address the challenge by answering the series of questions on the worksheet. Key learnings will be that: 1. No matter what the challenge, a policy manual based on PG principles has articulated values, at least at the broadest level, about virtually every organizational circumstance; 2. Referring to a board's policies as the first step in addressing a challenge expedites focus, efficiency and consistency with board-stated values; and 3. Boards, like other teams, perform best when acting in accordance with some sort of "playbook."