Governance

Whistle

Structure

Board

NB All members (excluding employees) to be BIFM Members or Fellows

Members’ Council

Members council

Executive

At the 2004 Annual General Meeting the members overwhelmingly approved the re-structuring of the Institute by placing the responsibility for running its affairs into the hands of a Board.

Members’ Council was formed as an advisory group to the Board with responsibility for electing volunteers to the Board and into the offices of Chair, Deputy Chairs and Immediate Past Chair.

This Members’ Council represents the stakeholders of the Institute and includes two representatives directly elected by the membership and two elected by corporate members. Members can exercise their influence on the Institute through these elections or by involvement in the regions, special interest and sector forum groups whose chairs sit on Members’ Council.

The Board delegates the day to day running of the Institute to an Executive which is made up of the employed senior management team. The re-structuring has also introduced a new main committee – Audit & Governance. The other key committees are:

Professional Standards & Education
Knowledge
Membership Services

The rules governing the way things are done are:

Memorandum of Association being the objectives
Articles of Association being the high level rules set by members
Bylaws being the detailed rules that can be changed by the Board but need ratification by members
Code of Conduct setting the ethical standards which are mandatory for members
Conflict of Interest Policy (see Elections below)
Privacy Policy to abide by the Data Protection Act

Accountability to members is effected by:

Annual audited accounts
Annual Review
Annual General Meeting currently held in September

Members have additional ways to express their views:

Direct e-mail or correspondence to the Executive
The online forums
Direct e-mail or correspondence to the Audit & Governance committee

Elections - conflicts of interest
A sub-committee of the Board has been set up of Graham Briscoe (Chair), Chris Wood and Rob Greenfield to review declarations of interest and to decide whether any nominee has a material potential conflict of interest and if so whether it is one that should prohibit them from standing for election.

Review and decision will be in accordance with the Institute’s Conflict of Interest Policy.

AGM
The minutes of the Annual General Meeting held on 30 September 2004 are shown below which should be read in conjunction with the Notice of that meeting to see the full resolutions passed.

The 2006 AGM took place on 5th October.