Board meetings: how to run them and keep a record

A board meeting with no minutes is a conversation. With minutes, it is work — and evidence.

A board meeting is bound by almost no legal formality: no compulsory notice, no quorum, no required minutes. That is a freedom, and it is also why so many boards spin: two hours of discussion, no identifiable decision the next day.

The little formality you impose on yourselves makes all the difference.

How often?

Three or four meetings a year suffice in a healthy building, provided they land at the right moments: after the accounts arrive, before the meeting notice goes out, in autumn for works, and once mid-year for follow-up.

A building with a live project or litigation meets more. A board that meets once, a fortnight before the general meeting, controls nothing: it endorses.

An agenda, however short

Three lines sent two days ahead transform the meeting: everyone arrives knowing what will be dealt with, and nobody needs an hour to recall the file.

• Items carried over from last time, with their status.
• Subjects to settle, phrased as questions rather than themes.
• Documents to read beforehand, attached or accessible.
• The time allowed — a meeting with no announced end always ends late.

The second line changes everything: “the lift contract” is not an agenda item; “should we get two more lift quotes before the general meeting?” is.

What belongs in the meeting, and what does not

A board meeting is not a residents’ meeting. Individual grievances, neighbour disputes and one flat’s charges invite themselves in naturally, and smother it just as naturally.

The useful reflex: note it, route it to the manager, return to the agenda. See neighbour disturbances and communicating with owners.

Minutes: five lines beat nothing

No text requires them, yet they are the most useful thing a board produces. They serve three times: for those absent, for the general meeting the board must report to, and for the next board picking up the files.

• The date, who attended, who did not.
• What was examined, one sentence per subject.
• The opinion given or decision taken, with who does what and by when.
• What is pending, and whose answer is awaited.

That format takes ten minutes to write, and feeds the board’s annual report directly. See the annual report template.

Minutes are not a formality: they are what proves, two years later, that the board raised the alarm.

When the board holds a delegation

Formality changes nature: within the delegated scope the board no longer advises, it decides. The written record of that decision, with its amount, then becomes the only protection of those who took it. See delegating powers and members’ liability.

Gathering a scattered board

The difficulty is almost never the agenda: it is finding a date. A five-member board with different schedules takes three weeks to meet, and the urgent subject waits.

Hence a mixed way of working: routine exchanges in writing, continuously, with the meeting reserved for calls that deserve discussion. See going digital as a board.

The calendar that wins a general meeting

The most strategic meeting of the year is the one before the notice goes out: that is where you decide what will be put to the vote, and therefore what can be decided. Once the notice has gone, it is too late. See preparing the general meeting.

Keep the record with CoproHarmony

CoproHarmony lets you prepare the agenda, record decisions and find any set of minutes by date, without digging through three inboxes. Create your free space.