Club Committees - LSV Club Support Manual

A club committee (or sometimes called a Club Board) is the group of people, elected according to the rules or constitution of the club to run the club on behalf of the members and to plan strategically and implement measures to ensure the sustainable future of the club.

a) Responsibilities of the Committee

There are many duties to be covered by a club committee, some of those include:-

Comply with all legislation, especially: Association Incorporation legislation; Member protection, welfare and safety; Fund-raising legislation; Food handling legislation; and Liquor licensing laws
Ensure the club is run according to its rules (constitution), purpose, policies and procedures – if you are on the committee, it is really important that you have a copy of the rules, understand them thoroughly and run your club according to them. In many cases the club rules will also define additional responsibilities for the committee and its office holder.
Oversee the financial affairs of the club, ensuring the club stays solvent (which simply means being able to pay your clubs bills as and when they become due).
Ensure the sustainability of the club – most people link club sustainability simply to financial sustainability, but it also relates to ensuring the club has a sustainable number of participants and volunteers, access to suitable facilities as and when you need them and often overlooked but vitally important is community support.
Create and manage a risk management plan that minimises risks associated with all club activities.
Plan, define and deliver the club’s objectives and strategic plan for the future.
Create your club culture and ensure expectations are met.
Ensuring the sporting, competitive and social needs of members are met.
Recruiting, empowering, recognising, rewarding and maintaining club volunteers.
Creating and implementing a succession plan for all roles within the club, ensuring that the next generation of volunteers are being identified, developed and trained.
Regularly communicate with club members.
Collect, protect, maintain and hand over critical club information from one year to the next.

b) Committee Activity

Club committees carry not only the hopes, dreams and expectations of the club members but also a lot of responsibility. If the committee is also doing most, if not all, the day-to-day work around the club (as happens in a lot of clubs) then chances are it does not have time to focus on the committee’s broader responsibilities or delivery of the club’s strategic objectives.

A committee doing “all the work” is likely to suffer burn-out and rarely is it preparing the next generation of volunteers so make sure one of the key focuses of your committee is to create a culture of volunteering at your club.

c) Committee Member / Director Responsibilities

Directors owe certain duties to the Club and its members by virtue of their position of trust. They are:

To exercise rights and powers in good faith and for the benefit of the Club
To comply with both common law duties and statutory duties
To act for a proper purpose
To act in good faith and honesty
To perform directors’ duties with care, skill, and diligence
To avoid conflict of interests (conflicting interests must be disclosed)
To not use confidential information for an improper purpose (e.g., to gain personal benefit)
To not divert corporate opportunities
To not incur debt (unless in reasonable business practice)

If directors fail to satisfy their duties, they may be liable to compensate members of the Club or 3rd parties.

The legal requirements of officeholders are set out in the Corporations Act 2001. If you’re ever unsure about your obligations, we recommend getting professional advice.

Keep in mind that as the officeholder, you are responsible for making sure that the company meets all its obligations.

Directors of Corporation Act 2001 (Cth) entities are now required to obtain a Director ID. Director IDs are a newly introduced unique identifier designed to provide traceability of a director’s profile and association with companies over a director’s career, and help prevent illegal and other fraudulent activity. This requirement only applies to Corporations Act entities and does not apply to Directors of incorporated associations registered with ACNC (i.e. our Clubs Directors).

d) Committee Executive

A clubs’ Constitution may define the executive committee as being made up of 7 positions. These essential positions are as follows: -

President
Vice-President
Secretary
Treasurer
Registrar
General Committee Positions x 2

As the name implies, an executive committee has special responsibilities and authorities above all committees. Usually it can act on behalf of the full board. Its main purpose is to facilitate decision making between board meetings or in urgent and crisis circumstances.

e) Support & Sub Committee Roles

The Club may decide to have additional roles to successfully manage the Club’s activities.

These support roles should be distributed amongst members willing to help out but not necessarily wanting to be on the committee.

These roles will be overseen by the committee member assigned and they will assist if needed. Many members may already have skills that will be useful in these roles.
Roles can be shared between multiple people if preferred.