Annual General Meetings
Hello,
We are registered as an Industrial and Provident Society for the benefit of the community. We are approaching the end of our first year of trading and are planning for our AGM. We would like some advice on how to conduct the AGM. The sort of questions we have are:-
- Do we need to send out the accounts with the invitations to the AGM?
- How do we conduct the election of officers? (we are assuming that someone who is not one of the exisitng officers will need to run this part of the meeting)
- Do people who wish to stand on the committee/management group have to be nominated before the meeting?
I would be very happy for any advice you can give.
Tags
Dear Michele,
At Tackley shop in our first year we sent out a full set of accounts to everyone just as you are thinking of doing. My advice would be don't bother. It was lots of photocopying and for most people too much detail and confusing. Now we have an invitation with just a few of the key numbers on it. Much better and as long as you as say that full accounts are available to anyone who wants them that is sufficient. You can also have a few copies at the AGM itself.
In terms of electing officers we do ask for nominations before the meeting simply because of having some idea of what the position will be on the night. One of the officers does run this part of the meeting and just steps aside for the part of his/her post.
Hope this helps
Gill Withers
I
Our shop is beginning to plan for our first AGM, and we had a good discussion the other day about how we should approach elections to the board. As it is our first AGM the current board members have not been elected, and so we want to give our members a good opportunity to exercise their democratic rights, whilst at the same time ensuring some continuity on the board.
We were considering the idea of making half of the board positions open for election, with the other half up next year, and so on. I would be very interested to learn about other shops' experiences and processes in this regard.
What works for you?
Hello
We are about to have our first AGM at Hindon Village Stores (Wiltshire).
One thing you might consider is whether you need to have your annual accounts audited... if ,like us, your turnover is less than about £5 million (!!) then you are required by the FSA to produce Annual Accounts but not a full audit (which is onerous and expensive)... but you have to ask your members at your AGM for permission to opt not to have an audit! You have to pass a resolution to this effect and I understand you have to send this resolution out in advance of the meeting (with your agenda).
If you have used the standard model rules for your society there will be a section on this setting out what you do!
Please do contact me if you want more details or how we have worded our resolution.... it's not difficult!
I hope this is helpful
Shaun Moore . Hindon Shop Limited
Hello Michele
You might find the pdf below useful. It gives general guidance on how to run an agm.
Harriet
Generally your IPS rules should contain the answers to most of these questions.