Building Contestability in Governance Committee Decisions

Scrutiny of decision-making is at an all-time high, and it has never been more important to ensure that your governance committees are appropriately considering and deliberating the decisions that they make. Better business decisions come from the sharing and consideration of different ideas, which can improve business outcomes, drive performance and help you break free from the status quo.

How do your governance committees make decisions? Are papers put forward only for noting, or recommendations endorsed quickly without time to consider alternate ideas or to challenge assumptions and supporting information? Do committee members meet and agree outcomes before the meeting is held?

To increase accountability, innovation and consideration of diverse perspectives, we require ideas to be contested — but what does this mean in the governance context?

What contestability means

Contestability is where ideas and decisions are openly and robustly challenged to drive performance and accountability. In action, it looks like:

• Informed, respectful and robust deliberation by committee members on how best to achieve desired outcomes.
• Different perspectives and ideas heard from a range of committee members, not just the line manager or subject-matter expert.
• Innovation and new ideas encouraged to challenge the status quo.
• Wins celebrated and failures turned into lessons learned, establishing a positive accountability culture rather than one of shame and blame.

When contestability is missing:

• Committees note papers or endorse decisions made outside the boardroom, without proper discussion or consideration of alternative views.
• Business continues as it always has; lessons are not learned and new ways of working are overlooked.
• Emerging risks are missed, as are new opportunities.
• Projects and plans slip, putting budgets, scope, schedule and benefits at risk without consequences or contingency plans.
• Members focus within their direct line of management and do not cross into other areas, leading to siloed thinking and patch protection.
• Transparency is lacking, raising the integrity risk of decisions.

Building contestability into your frameworks

Contestability requires an established culture that supports positive accountability, and governance arrangements designed to enable proper decision-making. Within your governance frameworks, there are several ways to support committees to contest ideas and decisions:

1. Quality papers — the quality of discussions and decisions often rides on the quality of the papers that inform them. Papers should be circulated in advance, giving members enough time to read and prepare without the information becoming out of date, and should be concise, clear and complete. Allowing late papers to become the norm leads to poor governance.
2. Meeting preparation — the expectation that members prepare for meetings needs to be clear and explicit. When papers are read in advance, presenters can take papers as read and present by exception, focusing on answering questions and deliberating options. Providing complex questions ahead of time lets presenters come better prepared and reduces questions taken on notice.
3. Periodic rotation of roles within the committee or lines of management encourages members to look beyond their current responsibilities, helping to break down silos and patch-protection behaviours.
4. Clearly documented roles and responsibilities that avoid duplication and facilitate effective decision-making. Mapping these across the governance framework — including how information flows between bodies — optimises reporting and removes bottlenecks. An empowered secretary, supported by a well-resourced secretariat, is fundamental to a good governance culture.
5. Independent reviews of the function and performance of governance committees to ensure they are optimised and operating as designed, identifying better practices and readjusting arrangements as your organisation evolves.