Governance Working Group (GWG) Quarterly Report
In early January, the Governance Working Group met to finalize our proposed updates to the June 2019 Governance Pilot that were related to McDougall’s Standing Committee structure. These updates were approved at the January Leadership Council meeting. At a Town Hall meeting organized by the GWG later in January, these updates were shared with the congregation. After the presentation congregational members were invited to participate in a guided conversation where they also provided feedback about their experiences related to volunteering at McDougall.
At the AGM on February 23 a slate of candidates for the 2020 Leadership Council (as outlined in the Governance Pilot) was presented and approved. Following the AGM, I scheduled individual meetings with the Leads of each Ministry Team, Vision Team and Working Group to discuss with myself and Marjorie MacRae (member of the GWG) their team’s transition to the pilot governance structure. About half of these meetings had to be postponed once we entered COVID19 response mode in mid March. These governance transition meetings will be rescheduled once things settle down.
The second Leadership Council meeting for 2020, originally scheduled to for March 29, had to be postponed as well, not only because of the social isolation requirements but because leadership energies of the Leadership Council meeting planning team had to be diverted to operations and communications issues related to the COVID19 pandemic. The Leadership Council will be rescheduled once both the format (face-to-face or Zoom) and the revised Agenda topics have been determined.
The unprecedented events in our wider community and the world this quarter have reminded me that not all change can be planned or controlled. The changes to the governance structure at McDougall that the GWG has spent the past two years envisioning, developing proposing and implementing were slow in coming compared to the speed at which we have had to make in response to the impact of COVID19 on the life and well-being of our church. Hopefully the relationships we have built between our staff and volunteer leaders during this governance restructuring work has helped us build the foundation we need to guide our McDougall community safely through these deeply uncertain times.