It's 1789. The committee has been in power for generations. No succession plan. No performance review. Louis XVI has been in the top job since he was 19. The membership hasn't been consulted on anything. The budget is a disaster. And when the members finally lose confidence in the committee, the feedback mechanism is extremely robust.

In this Bastille Day special — recorded live from Central France — Kate M and Kate H use the French Revolution as a case study in what happens when an organisation completely fails at succession planning and performance review. They cover the skills matrix, the cautionary tale of Robespierre, how subcommittees work as a talent pipeline, and a simple three-part performance review process that any committee can use. The governance content is completely serious. The framing is not.

Also covered in this episode:
What succession planning is — and what it is absolutely not

• L'État, c'est moi — the fastest route to a committee that has lost touch with its members
• The Committee of Public Safety: 12 members, enormous powers, zero accountability — and what followed
• The question every long-serving committee member needs to ask themselves honestly
• And the compelling case for recruiting firefighters onto your committee 🚒

Biased minutes. A chair ignoring a committee decision he disagrees with. A treasurer who resigned with no notice and took everything with them. A president who's been in the job for eleven years and nothing ever changes. Real questions from real committee members — and in this first Your Questions Answered special, Kate H and Kate M work through eleven of them in plain English. With the occasional Iced VoVo.

Questions covered in this episode:

• Taking accurate minutes when the secretary is also the most argumentative person in the room?
• Whether you can require committee members to prepare for meetings?
• What happens when a chair refuses to act on a decision he disagrees with?
• Whether decisions made without a quorum are legally valid?
• What to do when a nominee won't supply a candidate statement?
• Handling a committee member who's breaching confidentiality?
• Whether your fundraising raffle needs a licence?
• Whether the committee can reject a nomination for personal reasons?
• What to do first when your treasurer resigns without notice and takes everything with them?
• How to move a club forward without offending the past?
• How to move on a long-serving president without causing a war?

Got a question of your own? Submit it at thecommitteeroom.com.au — your question might shape a future episode.

Full show notes and free downloads at The Committee Room

One subcommittee signs a two-year venue contract nobody authorised. Another finds the perfect venue, waits for committee sign-off, and loses it while they're waiting. Both end badly. Both have the same cause: nobody wrote down who was actually allowed to do what.

In this episode Kate H and Kate M make the case for the delegations register — not as dry governance paperwork but as one of the most practically useful documents a committee can have. They cover decision-making authority by role and function, how tiered financial authorities work in practice, who can enter binding contracts and under what circumstances, why listing what can't be delegated matters just as much as listing what can, and how to start from scratch if your committee has nothing written down.

Full show notes and free download at The Committee Room.