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Corporate governance & performance   

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Key Offerings

Our key offerings on corporate governance and performance are:

Key Benefits

In governing your organisation and conducting your business, your stakeholders expect you to:

  • be Accountable

  • be Effective

  • show Integrity

  • be Open and inclusive

  • be Up-to date and innovative.

They want you to be representing their interests, spending their money wisely and ensuring best value service provision whatever the eventuality.

And that is no mean task! Especially when you know that your world is full of critics and inspectors ready and willing to tell you where your corporate governance and performance falls short of expected standards. And the UK political and business world seems to breed a new critic every day. Ever felt that they are queuing up to bayonet your wounds?

And do you know where these inspectors will rate your corporate governance? Are you a rising star or a dinosaur?

Are your governance structures, processes and roles fit for purpose now - or were they developed for a different age? Do you feel that your decision-making and operations are unwieldy and bureaucratic and that they could do with streamlining and up-dating? Are they dragging down your performance?

Do you need help to get your structures, processes and roles in shape?

If so, our corporate governance diagnostic is a structured framework that we have developed based upon best practice governance in the public, not-for-profit, and private sectors. It will help you to pinpoint your strengths and weaknesses in your corporate governance and capitalise on or correct them. You will be well placed to: 

  • be fleet of foot in your innovations
  • make swift decisions that are transparent and follow due process
  • prove to your stakeholders that you are representing their interests in the best way that you can.

And how effective is your performance management? Do you have a real handle on your organisation's performance against current strategies and plans?

If not, we can help you to update your performance dashboard to ensure that you have the key information at your fingertips. It is essential to do this before acquiring new performance management software.

Don't let software drive your performance monitoring. Remember that what gets measured, gets managed. Ensure that you measure what you need to manage not what is simply readily available off the shelf.

Of course, a pre-cursor to effective performance management is that you have effectively and creatively up-dated your vision, strategies and plans. We can help you to do this if you've not done it recently through our strategic and service planning approach.

A key component of governance and performance is, of course, financial management. Probably the most effective way to undermine confidence in an organisation's governance and leadership is a financial management failure. The causes of failure are rarely clear and there are often several inter-related factors such as failings in governance and leadership, poor financial planning and budgeting, weak decision-making, inadequate monitoring and reporting, and ineffective remedial action. Partnership working nor surprisingly blurs the boundaries of responsibility.

However confident you are in your organisation's financial management, we can help bolster that confidence through an independent challenge. Through our financial management diagnostic, we review the cogs of your financial management regime and pinpoint where failures have taken place or are likely to occur. We then work with you to address weaknesses and build confidence with both internal and external stakeholders. And, whilst we can't promise that there is a crock of gold at the end of the rainbow, there are often efficiency savings highlighted through our work that can make your existing crock go further.

Our Capabilities and Credentials

We are extremely well placed to help you to help you to improve your governance, performance and financial management.

Shelley Thornton is an acknowledged authority on corporate governance and  has been involved in better governance initiatives in the UK and internationally for many years. For example, she has been involved in:

  • UK public and not-for-profit initiatives such as: Corporate Governance in Local Government - A Keystone for Community Governance published in 2001 by the Chartered Institute for Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) and the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives (SOLACE) which is being used by the Audit Commission in its Corporate Performance Assessments (CPAs) of English and Welsh local authorities; Audit Commission advisory boards; CIPFA's Corporate Governance - A Framework for Public Service Bodies; and various other initiatives to improve corporate governance and financial management in central government, the NHS, and the social housing and education sectors. She has also provided input to the Nolan/Neill/Wickes Committee on Standards in Public Life
  • UK private sector initiatives such as the Cadbury, Hampel and Turnbull reports and governance initiatives of the Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies (CCAB) and the Auditing Practices Board (APB)
  • international better governance initiatives of the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC), the European Accountancy Federation (FEE) and the European Union.

Our Practical Experience

We have provided practical advice to public, not-for-profit and private sector organisations in diagnosing weaknesses in, and improving, their governance, performance and financial management arrangements. Our clients have been very grateful for our help.  

Contact Us

If you would like to find out how we can help you with your corporate governance, performance and financial management, please contact us today by e-mail at admin@heart2head.com

 

Send mail to admin@heart2head.com with questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2009 Heart2Head Ltd, Registered in England and Wales, Registration Number 4416818,  Registered Address 4 The Waldrons, Oxted, Surrey, RH8 9YQ. Heart2Head Ltd accepts no responsibility for any decision or action taken or omitted in reliance on the information in this website.