Board documents must be clear and concise with the highest level of understanding. Only go into operational detail when it is essential for making strategic decisions. Utilize charts or graphs as a way to summarize information or to show trends in data. In an appendix, it is helpful to provide a link for more technical details or statistics.
The document should outline the reason for the paper (information or discussion or seeking a resolution) and include an executive summary that provides the view publisher site recommendations. Ideally, the executive summary should not go on greater than 4 – 5 lines.
The paper should outline the most important issues and risks related to the proposal. If the risk is a significant one there should be a clear mitigation plan and its likely impact should be identified. It is crucial to include the possibility of future risks if the proposal is not fully implemented or not successfully achieved, even it is thought to be low.
The paper should describe various alternatives that were considered during the decision making process. It should give a summary of the pros and cons or explain how the most preferred option scored on the relevant decision criteria. Included is an analysis of alternatives. This is important as it gives the Board with a range of choice to consider in their governance responsibilities and helps to ensure that all possible outcomes were thought through.