CIPS Explains Governance Changes – and More To Come (We Hope!)

You may have seen the email from Malcom Harrison, CEO, and the information on the CIPS (Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply) website concerning some of the governance changes being enacted and proposed by the Institute.

It is good to see CIPS communicating like this and the note does answer many of the questions about the replacement of Congress by the Membership Committee. It was good to understand more too about the Volunteer Engagement Group – and to see some contrition for the variable  communication of the changes over recent months.

The “Q & A” section in that communication also briefly addressed the President issue, although again it talks about other ambassadorial roles, which we have seen little evidence of in recent times.

The big gap was the lack of mention of the Global Board of Trustees (GBT) and Nominations Committee, and how abolishing Congress also means that CIPS members at the moment have no vote and no influence on those two central governance groups. That also brings about the issue of the “circularity” I highlighted previously, with those two committees nominating each other, which I still think is unwise and unsatisfactory.

However, I do understand GBT is actually discussing (as we speak, as it were) whether there might be some alternative approach here that would preserve democracy. So I’m going to hold off the trouble-making for a few days and see if white smoke and some alternative proposals emerge from the Easton chimney. If not, I’ll be back on the campaigning trail shorty, with the aim of preserving some sort of democracy for CIPS and its members.

In the meantime, do make your views known to CIPS directly, using the address they have set up for that purpose – haveyoursay@cips.org. I have passed on the comments I received when I ran our quick survey last week, but if you feel strongly about this, then obviously it would help for you to express your views directly – whether about Congress, the potential disenfranchisement, the Presidency or whatever!

I would stress though that I don’t believe the changes are down to CIPS management, which some of you have suspected. It is the Board of Trustees who are making these decisions; the senior team at Easton may not disagree with them, but we should be clear that these issues fall firmly into the Board’s area of responsibility.