#22 - Governance!
31 Jul 24
Governance is the suite of documentation that safeguards your organisation.
It does this by providing a configuration controlled, codified baseline to which the organisation strives to assure itself that it adheres to.
This ensures that the organisation is not exposed through non-compliance to either legislatory, regulatory or externally set standards to which it is mandated to comply to.
It also ensures consistency and repeatability thus avoiding errors, and fostering an iterative, continuous improvement culture to strive for excellence!
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#22 - Governance!
What?
For most people, the mere mention of the word 'Governance' sends them into a drowsy, coma-like state.
And that includes me, so bear with me as I tackle this important topic. Because without it, your business is standing into danger!
Quite simply, Governance is:
'...the system by which an organisation is controlled and operates, and the mechanisms by which it, and its people, are held to account. Ethics, risk management, compliance and administration are all elements of Governance.'
This translates into a suite of documentation that articulates the standards to which you will strive to operate.
Why?
So what? I hear you say!
Well, without it you have no benchmarks, no standards and no guarantee or assurance that repeatable processes are being performed to the level required. No repeatability to a consistent standard means that you are open to error because you can't train people to perform tasks correctly. It's also impossible to iteratively and continuously improve and get better at what you do, since there is no baseline to work from. If you exist in a safety orientated environment, that is a big issue.
Similarly, lack of Governance means that it is nigh impossible to assure yourself that legislatory and regulatory processes which are mandated to be complied with, are actually being met. And this means that the Company is hugely exposed to litigation and compensatory claims if it all goes wrong.
Nobody wants that!
How?
So, how do you implement Governance?
Start by following this checklist:
- Determine what legislatory and/or regulatory standards you must comply with by law. Codify these into a configuration controlled document.
- Look at your main processes, particularly those that involve safety. Codify these into a configuration controlled document.
- List the standards that you are striving to comply with that are set by external authorities. Examples of this would include standards which must be met in order to comply with accreditation purposes, perhaps for training delivery, or business quality, consistency, safety and efficiency. Examples would include the ISO suite of standards. Again, codify these into a configuration controlled document.
- For each process document, ensure that it is authored, approved and authorised by the appropriate levels of authority within the business.
- Each document should be configuration controlled and have its own unique reference code.
- Each document should have a version number which changes every time it is up-issued or amended, along with an issue date.
- Each document should be reviewed annually and re-issued to ensure the content remains relevant and compliant
- Each document should be listed within an Excel spreadsheet, along with document reference, author, version number, issue date, issue/version number and review date.
- Each document should remain extant and in date, unless a decision has been made to retire it.
- Documentary reviews should take place such that any up-issue is conducted before the old version becomes out of date. This way, the organisation never falls outside of Governance.
- Hard copies of documentation which are locally held need to be weeded of old versions, and only the latest copies held. Hard copies also need to be logged in terms of their location to avoid confusion as to what the latest version is.
- Personnel should be made aware of major re-issues of documentation and those major changes highlighted. If personnel need to be re-trained as a result of the new document version being issued, consideration should be given to any training overhead that this may attract. At the very least the new document should be circulated, and a signature log maintained to ensure that all relevant personnel have read and understood the changes that have been made.
In Summary
I hope that you enjoyed reading this newsletter and that it has given you food for thought.
Every organisation has Governance. It has to in order to assure itself that its operations remain legal and compliant with set standards.
Organisations with slack Governance cannot strive for continuous improvement since they cannot maintain a set standard of output/delivery.
Governance is the suite of documentation that holds it all together!
Have a great week!
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