Welcome to the BoardTalk newsletter for March 2018. If you have any feedback on our publication, please email us at governance@sportnz.org.nz.

Governance Mark
Congratulations to the New Zealand Recreation Association and Football New Zealand, recipients two and three of the Governance Mark for sport and recreation in New Zealand. Both organisations have been focussed on their governance processes for some time and the achievement of the Mark represents over a year of work in both cases.

Twenty More Women
Sport NZ and Appoint Better Boards have launched a programme to accelerate the increase of women directors on sport and recreation boards. Currently at 36%, an additional twenty women will take us to the minimum target of 40%. Women will need to apply to this programme and 30 of them will be selected by representatives of Appoint and Sport NZ to work with. We will also engage with sector boards as their AGM cycles come round.

For further information and to apply, please visit this job posting (a 30-second registration is required).

Others take a different approach
From 1 July 2019 sporting organisations in Victoria will be expected to comply with the mandatory '40% women on boards' quota in order to qualify for government funding. Read more.

The tenure debate
Director tenure was a point of debate in 2017. We maintain our position that tenure should be limited. The proposed revision to the UK governance code now requires chairs and non-executive directors to move on after nine years. Read more.

Four questions to ask
An excellent McKinsey piece centred on four questions to ask when serving on a non-profit board: “Directors need to probe, nudge, and prod to make sure the organisation achieves its full potential”. Read more.