Following the decisions of the General Assembly in Delhi, we have initiated the process to appoint a skills-based Board of Trustees and the Nominations and Governance Committee.
Perrett Laver has been appointed as the executive search firm to support the recruitment. Perrett Laver is one of the market-leading firms globally in the global non-profit arena. They have substantial knowledge of IPPF, having recruited a number of executive positions for us in the past. They have been asked to provide an initial list of the best 50 candidate from which the Transition Committee can then select 15 Trustees to serve on the Board of Trustees (with nine trustees coming from the IPPF membership and six external trustees), and for seven Committee Members to make up the NGC.
The Transition Committee will agree the recruitment process and timeframe when they meet on the 3rd /4th February. We anticipate that the search and advertising for both internal and external candidates will commence mid-February and will be open for about five weeks. Each MA will be contacted individually so you can expect further information in the next couple of weeks. We will be focusing on candidates with the appropriate skills, and that collectively form a Board which has diversity in all its forms, particularly in terms of gender, age, geography, and background. We will be seeking representation from across the globe and reflecting countries of different sizes and at different stages of development.
The Transition Committee will also be reviewing Terms of Reference that have been drafted for the future General Assembly, the Board of Trustees, and the Nominations and Governance Committee.
More information to follow soon.
Lynette Lowndes
Lead, Governance Support Team
Could you please explain what you mean by “appropriate skills”?
Dear Georges P Ntymba,
Thank you for posing this important question. The skills matrix that will be used in the recruitment is based on the recommendations made by the General Assembly in November 2019. We encourage everyone with an interest to apply and be part of this exciting process.
The criteria set at the GA are:
“Criteria for selecting individual Trustees to serve on the Board and its Committees should include having experience in one or more of the following areas:
•Leadership in SRHR
•Governance at the international or national level
•Senior executive experience
•Program delivery experience
•Financial control and oversight
•Risk management
•Legal expertise
• Fundraising and resource mobilization
•Experience of advocacy and working with government
•Youth networking/youth action
•Peer-to-peer service delivery
•Other skills, experience and attributes relevant to global governance.”
reat to see such progress. Well done and thank you to everyone who has worked so hard to reach this point.
I have not seen anything yet about the need for Board of Trustee knowledge/experience of Safeguarding. As Head of Safeguarding at IPPF, I remain deeply concerned about the lack of reporting of safeguarding incidents relating to the people that access our services. We have a long way to go to reach a position that I would hope we should be aiming for. Speaking as a Trustee myself of another charity (UK based), I would hope that one of the skills and experience criteria we ought to be seeking is that of a Trustee that can support IPPF to raise its game in this arena. We have come a long way to this end, but have a much longer way to go and I am concerned that we don’t have this high enough on our agenda.
Hi Vanessa,
Thank you for the kind and constructive comments which will be relayed to the TC.
Safeguarding is incredibly important in all aspects of the work, and the new Board of Trustees will have to work closely with the IPPF Secretariat to ensure that Safeguarding policies and their implementation adhere to best practice.
If you would like to get in touch with the TC directly, please write to TC@ippf.org
I really appreciate your effort to get at this stage & thanks for your clear updates !