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Big Picture
- CEO Update
- Highlights
- High-level Challenges
- Company Needs
Calibration
Tell the story of the company using the fewest number of metrics/charts to properly frame the current status.
Financial metrics
Financial performance & forecast (quarterly)
- Quarterly P&L
- Monthly waterfalls (revenue, burn, cash balance, headcount)
- Performance vs. Plan
Funnel metrics
- Website Visits
- Leads
- Conversions
- Conversion Rate
Product engagement metrics
- Signups
- Downloads
- Activations
- Engagement
- Retention
- NPS
Company Building & Updates
Org Chart
- Forward-looking - show current team and positions to be filled w/in 6 mo.
Product/Engineering
- Product Roadmap
- ---Major launches & achievements since last meeting
- ---Roadmap next 6 mo. (where is company heading)
- Major Challenges (where is help needed?)
Growth/Marketing
- Performance against KPIs
- Positioning
- Brand
- Messaging
- PR
Sales/BD
- Performance against KPIs
- Sales pipeline & forecast
- Major challenges (where is help needed?)
Operations (if appropriate)
- Performance against KPIs
- Major challenges (where is help needed?)
Working Sessions
Session One
- Deep dive into a functional area, partnership opportunity or business challenge
Session Two
- Deep dive into quarterly goals or product challenges
Closed Session
- Feedback to founders
- Formalities
- Stock option grants
Traditional board meetings often follow a very formal structure that begins with a call to order and proceeds through reports from officers, and motions. However, a new style of board meeting has emerged in the last ten years that follows a procedure more akin to how most meetings are run today. This is a more practical template for board meetings, one that does away with many formalities in favor of digging deeper into the issues.
Before we get into this agenda sample for this new kind of board meeting, let’s talk about your deck. Every board meeting also has a presentation that is distributed before the meeting and put up on a projection during the session. Your agenda and your deck are inextricably linked. So, as you plan your board meeting, you should use this agenda template as a structure for your board deck, as well. But, having a written agenda is also helpful, since you will want to take notes or minutes during the meeting, and filling in an agenda is one of the best ways to take meeting notes.
This sample board meeting agenda opens with a session on the Big Picture. Here the CEO has an opportunity to frame the board meeting in context. Keep this framing somewhat brief and at a very high level. Everything brought up here will be addressed in more detail later on.
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