Technology

Arrange Sound Governance Properly with Boardroom Software

Published

1 year ago

on

April 28, 2022

By

Rupali Gupta

Good corporate governance is the key to success for any organization. An organization’s leadership is responsible for keeping the company on track to achieve both short-term and long-term goals. Effective corporate governance means the leadership is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.

However, the road to good governance is not easy by any means. Board members face different sorts of challenges, such as the inability to access board material easily and a lack of coordination. It is the organization’s responsibility to facilitate board members in every way possible.

Talking about facilitation, board portal software has made corporate governance easier and more effective. The virtual board software has specifically addressed two main issues of organization boards — inefficient collaboration and difficulty accessing board material.

Today’s guide is about board management software and its role in good corporate governance. Let’s start with the basics.

What is board portal software?

Board portal software, or simply board portal, is a cloud-based virtual space specifically designed for facilitating collaboration between an organization’s leadership, including directors, chairpersons, CEOs, CFOs, corporate secretaries, board presidents, etc.

A virtual boardroom is also a data repository where boards can store corporate information, board materials, and other important company records. Board members can upload, access, share or edit files stored in the board portal. They can easily interact with other board members.

Technically, board portals ensure that board members can access board material and collaborate easily. The best part? All of this happens in a controlled and secure environment.

Role of board portals in effective corporate governance

Let’s see how board management software helps corporate leadership with its responsibilities.

1. Effective board document management

Effectively managing corporate board material is the first step in making life easier for board members. Board portals are paperless solutions; that means the board members won’t have to request paper copies of updated board material every time.

Virtual boardrooms allow the administration to upload board material categorically in folders and subfolders. Board members can download, edit, or print any document depending on their access level.

Furthermore, it is easy to locate any file in board portals; you can find any file by entering the keyword or file name in the search bar. Most importantly, modern virtual boardroom providers allow you to access board material without the internet.

2. Better collaboration

As board management software are centralized platforms, the boards use them as virtual workspaces. For example, board members won’t have to rely on insecure communication channels such as emails and social media accounts.

Virtual boardrooms allow users to communicate privately (one-to-one chats) and engage in group discussions. Group discussions are very helpful in addressing important issues and arranging brainstorming sessions. What’s more, board members can work on shared documents; they can edit or leave notes on any file.

Virtual board software is very useful in arranging mini-meetings and discussing important affairs without waiting for AGMs.

3. Paperless board meetings

Board management software has solved one of the biggest problems of organization boards — board meetings. A lot of corporations are still sticking to traditional board meeting practices where they have to wait for months to unite board members in AGMs or semi-annual meetings.

In comparison, board portals have just changed the whole scenario. Board meetings can be conducted in virtual boardrooms without compromising any board meeting standard. Here is how board software can help you arrange board meetings:

Agenda builder: You can use built-in meeting agenda templates or create your own easily. The agenda can be dispersed to all participants after recommendations and approval from the board chairperson.
Audio and video conferencing tools allow the boards to conduct the meeting as per their needs.
Boardbook and meeting minutes can be prepared and shared with all the board members electronically.
E-signature feature allows board members to sign any document, initiate a motion, and cast votes electronically during board elections.

Board members can access the board book, meeting minutes, and agenda whenever they want.

4. Accountability and transparency

Board portals bring transparency to the board’s operations because everything is recorded in board management software. The board portal software records every vote cast, every decision made, every comment made, and even a simple edit in a document.

Audit trails provide you with all the details about every activity in the boardroom — who did what and when. It also makes things easier from the legal point of view because boardroom recordings can be used as evidence in case of a lawsuit.

5. Cost-effectiveness

Utilizing corporate resources optimally is an important part of the board’s job description. Virtual board software helps organizations by streamlining the corporate governance tasks and helps them reduce multiple business expenses.

On average, an organization consumes 100,000 papers monthly (imagine the cost of 100,000 high-quality papers). A virtual boardroom software can cut that cost to zero. In fact, how can you forget the printing cost, stationery cost, and document distribution cost? Not to mention the traveling costs of board members during board meetings.