To be voted on at the 2007 AGM…

After an Extraordinary General Meeting in 2005 BASES re-structured to have a Strategic Management Team (SMT), Council and three Divisions. Having been in place for two years, a review within the SMT and feedback from Divisions and members has revealed some aspects of the BASES structure that could be improved to enhance effectiveness. Therefore, the SMT is proposing some changes to the structure of BASES that it believes will enable the Association to better achieve its objectives.

The key proposed changes are:
1. Establish a Board, replacing the Strategic Management Team, to oversee the management of BASES. The Board will focus more on developing strategy, devolving the implementation of strategy to the Divisions and other committees. The Board will include the Chairs of the Divisions.
2. Dissolve the BASES Council.
3. Cease to have the elected positions of Honorary Secretary and Honorary Treasurer.
4. The Division of Education and Professional Development to become directly responsible for all Education and Training, Supervised Experience and Accreditation.
5. Establish an Operational Group to enhance the functioning of BASES employed staff.
6. Establish a Chair's Committee to evaluate the performance of the Operational Group and the Executive Officer.

The rationale for the proposal is based on an evaluation of the effectiveness of the re-structure agreed at the 2005 Extraordinary General Meeting. The existing structure has not functioned as effectively as initially expected. Several key issues have been identified.

There was some confusion as to the role of the Council and despite considerable effort a suitable President could not be appointed. Ultimately, this led to questions of the role and effectiveness of the Council.

The SMT had the role of developing strategy, implementing the strategy and overseeing the management of BASES. This workload is extremely heavy for a small SMT. Thus, there is a need to distribute the workload across a greater number of BASES committees.

On reflection the link between the Divisions and the SMT in the re-structure was not sufficiently effective. The perceived strength of the re-structure was that the Divisions would better represent the needs of exercise scientists, sports scientists and staff involved in education but the lack of representation on the SMT limited this impact. Thus, it is logical to include the chairs of the Divisions on the Board.

The review then questioned the role of the Honorary Secretary and Honorary Treasurer in the new structure. Both are historical reflections of the old Executive Committee and the roles are no longer relevant given that the BASES Office Manager (also the Company Secretary) performs the secretarial duties and the Executive Officer liaises with the accountants. Thus, the Honorary Secretary and Honorary Treasurer positions will cease to exist.
It did not seem logical to have a Division of Education and Professional Development that is not responsible for all Education and Training, Supervised Experience and Accreditation, thus this should come under this Division.

As the Association grows and has an increasing number of staff it was logical to establish a formal mechanism to coordinate employed staff by the formation of an Operational Group.

Currently evaluation of the performance of the Executive Officer is the sole responsibility of the BASES Chair, however in line with good corporate governance it is proposed that the evaluation of the Executive Officer and the Operational Group is carried out by a committee consisting of the BASES Chair and the non-executive directors, called the Chair's Committee.

Some of the proposed changes are related to adopting accepted practice of corporate governance. As BASES is a Limited Company it was deemed prudent to select the aspects of corporate governance that would ensure that BASES delivers the highest quality services to its members without burdening the Association with all the procedures found in large corporations.

Proposal for Restructure of BASES: Replacing the Strategic Management Team with a Board and dissolving the Council