Good governance across Aotearoa

Published 8 July 2019

[  5 minutes to read]

Ko te manu e kai i te miro nōna te ngahere, Ko te manu kai i te mātauranga, nōna te ao.
The bird that eats the miro berry owns the forest. The bird that feasts on knowledge owns the world.

Since we started our Governance Project we have found that there’s a growing interest in governance around the country and new resources and tools are popping up all over the motu (land).

Many charities will know of CommunityNet Aotearoa(external link) – the online hub of free resources. There is a wealth of information on this website so make sure you bookmark it and return to it regularly. It is updated often, with fantastic contributions from the sector.

CommunityNet Aotearoa is looked after by the good folks at NZ Navigator(external link) who have developed an online assessment tool for community organisations. Charities Services supported the development of this tool, in partnership with Platform Trust, Bishop’s Action Foundation and Rabid Technology. Assessing your organisation through NZ Navigator provides a great bench marking report that shows where your organisational strengths lie and where some development is needed. It’s free and easy to use. We encourage charities to use it at least once a year to help with their development and growth.

Sport New Zealand offers a number of excellent governance resources and their free online governance course(external link) is available to all (not just sporting groups) to access. You can also download the guide Nine steps to effective governance – building high performing organisations(external link) or access it online, thanks to the generosity of Boardworks International.

A few weeks ago, SociaLink(external link) in Tauranga released a comprehensive collection of information and training resources on governance. We loved their work so much we asked them to feature in our newsletter as the “Sector Showcase”. Ka rawe!

Te Puni Kōkiri(external link) has great governance resources for Māori organisations which place importance on tikanga, kawa and values that meet the aspirations of iwi, hapū and whānau. The Māori Land Court also supports good governance with resources in both English(external link) and Te Reo Māori(external link) that outline the duties of a trustee of a Māori land trust. Toi Ohomai in the Bay of Plenty offer a level 4 kaupapa Māori governance course(external link).

If you are looking to become a governance professional then you’ll be pleased to know that Governance New Zealand have just announced their new course, the Chartered Governance Professional, is starting in August 2019. You can find out more about this qualification on their website. The Institute of Directors offers a suite of governance training(external link) to equip you with the tools to perform in your role at each stage of your development as a director.

Across the country there are other great initiatives helping people to practice good governance. The Wheelhouse (Taranaki)(external link) has developed 9 short sharp help sheets(external link), Community Waikato (Hamilton) has advisors(external link) to work with you on governance and ANCAD (Auckland -North Shore) offer a range of affordable community resources(external link) to get you on the right track. If you’re an arts organisation, Creative New Zealand(external link) is your one stop shop. They have themed webinars available on YouTube with content from Graeme Nahkies (Boardworks International) and his Getting on Board(external link) publication.

This is by no means an exhaustive list, we could go on and on. We just ran out of blog space! We know that there are many people and organisations supporting good governance across Aotearoa. We are really interested in what’s happening in your region and would welcome you dropping us a line to let us know. You can email us at info@charities.govt.nz.

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