Tony Crouch
11 Jun 2012

The Pensions Regulator has tackled exactly the same issue of trustee competance by introducing Trustee Knowledge and Understanding (TKU) modules (http://bit.ly/LCXDhi). I have found these modules very useful and they do not seem to put off new trustees. This is the nearest an accreditation programme get without actually being an accreditation scheme!

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Janet Thorne
Director of Services
Reach Skilled Volunteering
28 May 2012

I'd agree that there is an urgent need for much more training for trustees - to help them deal with increasingly complex issues as suggested above, but also to clarify / reinforce understanding of what a good trustee / chair does.

One common issue is that boards tend to develop their own set of behaviours and expectations. Where the board is weak, this perpetuates poor performance, and training for new trustees is crucial to arrest this. However even good boards could benefit from new trustees bringing in fresh and up to date perspectives on good governance.

Compulsory training would be problematic, but charities could have an expectation that new trustees would attend training. After all, schools expect all governors to attend training (both inducation and specialist / update sessions). The key question is who will pay for this? Most smaller charities have no budget at all for governance...

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Barbara
25 May 2012

Formal, obligatory training for prospective trustees is a very dangerous idea with the potential to hamper development of communities and civil society as a whole. Let alone healthy activism.
Charities are not to deliver public services for cheaper price nor are they some form of public service. It's people's choice to get involved and this choice is one of the basic liberties: the freedom of association. Along with other liberties, such as freedom of speech or freedom of private live, this liberty has to be nurtured and protected. This is what makes Western world a liberal democracy and what attracts so many people here every day.
No condition must be put on becoming a trustee - once this is done one can as well take people's voting rights in general elections because their voice and 'good citizenship' is worth less than a grain of sand. Nobody would even think about literacy tests for voters these days but restraining trusteeship is somehow acceptable. Let it happen and there will be no freedom anymore.

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Hilary Barnard
Principal Consultant
HBMC
25 May 2012
Response to [Barbara]

I'm not in favour of compulsion directed towards Trustees in this way. However, I do think we have to get real about the need for much greater training resource (Liz Hudson is right), particularly for Chairs of Trustees, who are overseeing organisations that employ staff and are engaged in commissioning and procurement processes. Trustees need to understand, engage with and plan ahead how their organisations are involved in contracts and service level agreements, and the risks and opportunities involved (without being lost in the fine detail).

I agree that it is the people's choice whether they get involved but it is equally the charity's choice whether those people meet objective criteria for selection of its Trustees. In the process, we should ensure that there is training to help those with enthusiasm and commitment (but not all the skills and knowledge needed) to catch up and ensure a balanced and diverse Board.

It sounds very much as though this session at the Charity Commission rather lost its way. The concluding statement that the Commission would "take the issue of trustee training away and give it some serious thought” is incredibly vague.

Talk of Trustee self-reliance is all very well but it doesn't address the increasingly complex work that many Trustee Boards are being asked to take on.

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