A draft recruitment process has been developed in line with feedback provided by members at the three engagement sessions and the recruitment focus group in October 2016.
This process will be formally implemented in the event of members supporting the implementation of a new governance model proposed by the CAS board on 30 January. Initial steps have been taken to initiate the process for selecting an as yet unspecified number of External Trustees and the Independent Chair to ensure that the deadline of March for electing a new board can be met.
Key features
The key features of the recruitment process are:
- Consistent process for external and bureaux trustees
- Separate recruitment campaign for the Chair
- For other trustees, a single advertisement, role profile and skills matrix which covers requirements for both bureaux and external trustees A selection of candidates will be put to members for election except for the Chair, where one candidate will be put forward
- An external agency appointed to lead the selection process for year one
- A strengthened nominations committee involved at second stage interviews
The process
Members felt strongly that external and bureaux trustees should go through the same selection and election process so the process is similar for both categories of trustee. The recruitment process map shows the various stages that candidates would go through before they are put to the members for election. The process for the chair is identical, except that there will only be one candidate put forward for election.
There has not been a consensus on whether potential bureaux trustee candidates should be nominated or approved by their bureaux before applying, or whether they should be allowed to self-nominate. As there were strong feelings on both sides, it was felt that the best way to manage this was for this decision to rest with each individual bureau.
Nominations committee
Once the external agency has drawn up a long list of potentially suitable candidates, the nominations committee will conduct a second stage interview to decide on the short list of candidates to go forward for election.
Given this key role it is important that the Committee is brought up to strength with a full complement of five members as follows:
- 1 CAS chair
- 2 CAS trustees
- 2 bureaux representatives who will be co-opted using the below process.
Bureaux have been asked to nominate suitable candidates. All nominees will then be presented to the members who will be asked to vote electronically for the two candidates of their choice. The two candidates with the greatest number of votes will then be co-opted onto the committee for the purpose of selecting the list of new trustees to put before the members at the March 2017 AGM.
Election process
The aim is to elect Trustees with a range of relevant skills; and to offer a choice of candidates to the Members. Further work needs to be done on how to achieve this while ensuring a robust and manageable election procedure. We are developing possible options and plan to schedule a focus group to seek the views of members after the General Meeting on the 30th January.
