Commit

What the activity covers

Commitment is shown by regular evaluations, a delegation of authority and responsibility, an intent, scope and objectives that are set, a stated level of evidence, resources provided, results used as the basis for improvement, and oversight of how results and initiatives are reported.

What a working commit step looks like

A commitment that lives only in a group function's work plan is not the governing body's commitment. The test is whether a board resolution names the evaluation, the interval and the person accountable, and whether the controlled entity boards have seen it. Where the group is large, a single resolution that covers every entity is usually better than a separate one for each, because it fixes the same scope and the same evidence level across the group.

The artefact this activity leaves

• The governing body resolution that establishes the evaluation and its interval.
• The delegation of authority, with the person or committee responsible.
• The resources committed, in budget or time.
• The reporting line for the results and the improvement initiatives.

What goes wrong

An evaluation initiated by management with no governing body commitment is the common failure, and it caps the credibility of everything that follows.

Who owns it in a group

The controller's governing body owns the programme, but the activity has to reach every entity in the boundary. For commit, record which board or committee took the decision, which entities were included, and where an entity's own view differed. A programme that runs only at group level produces a group result that the entity boards do not recognise. Where an entity is excluded, record why: a recent acquisition, a joint venture with reserved matters or a board that has asked to be treated separately. An exclusion that is written down is a scope decision; an exclusion that is silent is a defect in the evaluation.

Where it sits

• All five activities
• The three aspects
• The six-point scale
• All 35 requirements