How and how often should board meetings be held?

Are you unsure how often your company should hold board meetings? Who convenes or simply who is in charge of the preparations? Then you should take a look at this article.

Practical info about board work and board meetings
Good board work is about the board working together to take care of their tasks in a good way. The board is responsible for tasks such as management, strategy and plans, management of the company, sound organization, equity, liquidity and risk.

In order to have good control and an overview of all these tasks, it is important to ensure a good meeting frequency and work structure in order to ensure this in good interaction between the board, daily management and owners.

How many board meetings are required for my business
‍Board meetings shall in principle be conducted as needed. It is the board itself that must find out how many meetings are needed via discussion about the tasks to be solved.

The Norwegian Companies Act does not set requirements for the number of meetings to be held during the year. On the other hand, it is recommended that the board convenes meetings at least once every four months, but you can have from five to ten board meetings to ensure that the board's supervisory responsibility towards the company is taken care of. Here, both the company's size and special situations will have an impact.

The general manager shall, at least every fourth month, notify the board of the company's activities, position and profit development, cf. the Norwegian Companies Act § 6-15. It is recommended that the board includes it as a board matter for consideration in its annual plan.

In special situations, such as mergers, it will be natural to have board meetings more frequently.

Who convenes the board meetings?
The responsibility for convening board meetings and for current issues to be raised lies with the chairman of the board. The chairman of the board also has the opportunity to delegate the responsibility to the general manager. It is common for a plan to be set up when the board meetings are to be held for half or a whole year at a time.

There are opportunities to convene extraordinary board meetings if there are special matters or urgent matters that arise. For example, in connection with acquisitions, difficult financial situations or bids for the company. The general manager and the board members can also request that extraordinary board meetings be convened.

Agenda for the board meetings
According to the Norwegian Companies Act § 6-21, the chairman of the board together with the general manager of the company is responsible for setting up the agenda with matters to be considered by the board. There is no final decision on what the agenda should look like, which can make it challenging for many to formulate it in the best possible way.

From Adminflow you can hold and create board minutes: In a separate digital board room.
Also ask for reading or comments on board documents or minutes and sign documents in the document center.

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