committee roles

ravenlooney

delete......

black-saturn

What kind of charity group is this?

If it's a branch of a large charity you should have a constitution. In that it will tell you what the laws of the group are. I'm pretty sure that every charity group will have to have the minutes drawn up to say exactly what was said at the meetings.

Is the chairperson of this group liked? How long has she been doing the post? It might be time for an anonymous revote.

Friction always happens between committee members in groups about what jobs are theirs. I ran and started up the Lowestoft Gingerbread group for 3 years and before that I ran another charity group for 5 years.

A couple of times I have had to ask someone from the head office or branch office of the charity to come and oversee what was happening as it was getting out of my control.

black-saturn

No her way of running things is not the norm. Her main job is to make sure everyone has an equal say and the group is run democratically. If she is making all the decisions it's not a group where everyone is happy and soon you will get people getting fed up and leaving.

The minutes should be written by the secretary/minutes secretary and never the chairperson. They dont have to be formally written up and each member doesnt have to have a copy. If they dont want to give each member a copy she can put one copy in a folder which is made available to each member to look at if they want to. At the start of each meeting the minutes secretary should go through the main points of the minutes so that the group members refresh their minds of what was said last time. The chairperson doesnt have any say or any right to edit the minutes. If the secretary got something wrong in the minutes it should be written about in the minutes of the next meeting.

cathriona

For a start, one of the secretary's roles is ensure that the Chairman signs the minutes of the previous meeting as a correct record of the proceedings. It sounds (from a little research that I have done) to be a very organisational role. See http://www.shef.ac.uk/acadsec/comsec/guidance/cttrole.html as an example of the role expectations in a university setting.

The role of the chairman seems to be more about understanding but according to http://www.pjonline.com/Editorial/20041218/society/p888councilmember.html also involves

Good communication skills, especially when dealing with politically sensitive issues
Ability to work with tact and diplomacy, firmly and fairly
Ability to chair meetings and encourage active participation in the meeting
Ability to work closely with senior staff, the conference team, external administrators and contributors to deliver all aspects of the conference.

I hope this helps
PS I dont think I have breached copyright here but plese put me right if I have

Mark7799

In the various groups I've been involved with (as one poster has already said) one of the first functions of a meeting is to approve the minutes of the last meeting - if these have been rewritten to a point where they don't reflect what was said then it is for the members to refuse to accept these minutes as a true record. This will require at least one person to stand up and be counted - hopefully this will then encourage the others to follow suit. As usual, in a group, if you want someone out then you have to be prepared with a replacement.

Savvy_Sue

It does sometimes happen that someone apart from the secretary will check minutes over before they are distributed - in fact it doesn't HAVE to be the secretary who takes the minutes. And it doesn't HAVE to be the chair who checks them, if that's going to happen. But either way, they need to be agreed as a correct record at the next meeting, so if the chairperson has corrected them to the point where they are no longer a correct record then yes, someone must say "That's not what was said." I used to take a lot of minutes, and much preferred to have them corrected before they were distributed, but I'd have taken offence if anyone just re-wrote them because they didn't like my style of writing! And I'd have kicked off if anyone had tried to change the substance of what had been agreed.

Your local CVS may be able to offer help, guidance, advice etc. Oh, look what I've just found on our local's website: The role of the chairperson. I'm sure somewhere there'll be similar for the secretary, but it can (and should) vary from organisation to organisation. Because at the end of the day, you have a job to get done. BTW there is a model constitution on that site as well, if that would help.

Is it worth having a quiet word with the chairperson and seeing if she realises the offence she's causing? Her experience may be that if you want something done, you do it yourself. And that if you want it done properly, you do it yourself.

Nile

The minutes secretary at meetings I attend uses a tape recorder as well as taking hand written notes. Perhaps your secretary could use a tape recorder too, which would be a useful tool if anyone (e.g. Chairman) disputed their minute taking accuracy.;)