Presiding over a meeting as the chair or chairman or chairperson is a role not a physical position. So if in your role of chairing the meeting, you physically move in order to carry out a duty or function, then you do not cease to be the chair of that meeting.

Even though you may be a member of an organisation which actually has a gavel which is used by the chair, if the chair moves away from the gavel, it does not mean that they do not take with them the authority of the chair.

In Karen’s case, she is a member of an organisation where a different member chairs each meeting, but there is an elected president who sits next to the person chairing the meeting. (This is unusual but not unheard of.) In this case, Karen would have the option of temporarily handing the meeting over to the president while she performed her other duty from another place in the meeting room, or simply stating when she moved that she was maintaining her role of chairing the meeting but she would be conducting her next function from the front of the room. My suggestion is the latter course of action – maintain the role and make a statement to that effect.

The words the person could use could be as follows:

“In my role as chairman of this meeting I am now going to go to the front of the room to make a presentation.”

You do not have to appoint a temporary chair when you physically leave the position from which you are chairing the meeting – your role continues where ever you are in the meeting room.

Caution: The term vacating the chair does not mean that you are physically vacating the chair, it means that you are vacating the role of chairing the meeting, which means that another person must assume the role of chair. Moving away from the position of the chair is not the same as vacating the chair.

Some legislatures and parliaments have a custom where the “chair” of the parliament – often called the Speaker or the President, must always sit in the designated position. Do not confuse this with everyday meetings which are usually  not subject to such strict customs.

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

The short answer is yes. The longer answer is that a wise chair will only move certain motions from the chair.

The only motions a president or person in the chair should move are motions of congratulations or motions of condolence or motions of thanks. These are nearly always “carried by acclamation” with the obvious exception of the motion of condolence. These are often carried without a seconder.

Inexperienced or “power chairs” sometimes move all sorts of motions and in so doing demonstrate their lack of understanding of their role.

Procedural motions should never be moved from the chair. For instance, a motion seeking to close debate, when moved from the chair, takes away all impartiality – the cornerstone of the chair’s authority.

Substantive or main motions can be moved from the chair technically, but a wise chair will not – they will invite a members to move the motion.

A chair may suggest that it would be appropriate for a particular motion (procedural or substantive) to be moved but encourage someone else to move it. They may even suggest the wording.

The minute a chair moves a motion from the chair, they have “declared their hand” and their impartiality goes out the window. They therefore cannot, with integrity, preside over the discussion which follows and their major role is to fairly and impartially preside.

Andrea also asks – What law this is held under?

There is no law as such, it is custom and good governance. Most meeting procedure authorities agree that the presiding person should not move motions from the chair.

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

In Australia and New Zealand it is custom to have every motion seconded. Whether it is a requirement however depends on your constitution or governing rules.

If your governing rules say that every motion requires a seconder, then that’s it – every motion (and amendment) requires a seconder. You cannot get around it.

If however your governing rules say nothing, then unless the act of parliament under which you operate says you need a seconder (and I know of none that do), then you do not need to call for a seconder.

If your custom is to have a seconder, but your rules do not require it, then it is wise to follow the custom but it is technically at the discretion of the chair to require or not require a seconder.

The smartest thing to do is always have a seconder – it demonstrates that there is some support for the motion. A motion (or amendment) which cannot attract a seconder is unlikely to succeed anyway.

If your organisation is outside Australia or New Zealand and uses Robert’s Rules of Order then the situation is slightly different.

Robert’s Rules do require a seconder in all circumstances (RONR [10th ed], p. 34-36) except two.

The two exceptions are:

1. Small boards. When a board has less than 12 members, motions do not require a seconder. (RONR [10th ed], p. 470)

2. When a committee report is given and a motion is moved to implement the report’s recommendations. (RONR [10th ed], p. 489)

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

Most meetings will have certain items about which there is very little disagreement. An interesting observation of human behaviour however is that even where there is very little disagreement, human beings seem to want to talk and talk and talk. Even though everyone agrees, human beings seem to want everyone to know that they agree.

While this may be interesting and while it may stroke people’s egos, it doesn’t contribute greatly to the productivity and effectiveness of a meeting. The use of a Consent Schedule can help this enormously.

Here is the way it works – The person preparing the agenda usually the secretary/minute taker and/or chairman works with the other person so that two people together decide which issues on the agenda will create minimal disagreement or none. These items are all left on the agenda but they are copied to another document called the Consent Schedule.

The Consent Schedule becomes a list of all of the items on the agenda which the president/chairperson and the secretary believe will not require discussion but can simply be agreed. This list may be short with only two or three items, or in a longer meeting it may include many items, each of which may be small in detail but may still be significant but for which there is anticipated to be no disagreement.

The Consent Schedule is then placed as a separate item on the agenda but very early on in the meeting, probably immediately following the confirmation of the minutes. This item is often called confirmation of the agenda. It can also be a separate piece of paper or it can be physically printed into the agenda itself, whichever way here is how it works.

The person chairing the meeting states that the Consent Schedule needs to be agreed to and asks if there are any items on the Consent Schedule which people want withdrawn.

One voice allows anything to be taken from the Consent Schedule or, you may over a time, determine that two voices are required to take something from the Consent Schedule – it’s up to you. My suggestion is to start with two and if that doesn’t work, go to one. So any two people can say – I’d like item x taken off the Consent Schedule and it then is dealt with when that item on the agenda is reached, because remember you’ve copied items from the agenda to the Consent Schedule, you have not cut them from the agenda – so they’re still there.

So you may end up with, let’s say, five items on the Consent Schedule upon which no-one disagrees and which everyone is happy to agree to. A motion is then called to agree to the items “en masse” of “en bloc”. One motion can be used for them all. The motion would be that all items on the amended Consent Schedule be agreed. That is moved, seconded and put to the vote. If it is carried then those five items when they are reached on the agenda are simply skipped because they are already dealt with. If anyone wants to raise them then, then it’s too late, they were dealt with in the Consent Schedule.

As your group or meeting becomes more mature it will get better and better at leaving things on the Consent Schedule in recognition of the increased effectiveness it gives and in recognition of the increased time it allows for the issues that really are worthy of discussion or where there is discussion required to reach agreement.

Consent Schedules are a useful tool to use in any meeting, business meeting or voluntary association or government appointed board. It is a wonderful way to take out items from the agenda upon which there is no disagreement and shorten the meeting.

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

Firstly, just what are apologies? They are NOT a list of people who have not shown up. They ARE  a list of people who have asked for their apologies to be submitted to the meeting.

So what’s the big deal? Well 99 times out of 100 it isn’t an issue but just occasionally there can be some legal ramifications.

A story I heard recently will certainly stop you recording apologies when people have not aked for them to be recorded. A man was driving to a meeting and had an accident. Since he did not turn up at the meeting, they recorded his absence as an apology. Sounds fine so far.

The problem came when he made his insurance claim for the accident and of course said he was on his way to a meeting. The insurance company checked and found his apologies had been given and they interpreted that as meaning that he had no intention of going to the meeting (since he had given an apology) and he had therefore lied in his claim about where he was going.

Moral of the story is if you receive an aplogy, record it, if you don’t – the person is listed as “not present” or “absent” or left off completely. Most organisations simply record those present and those who have tendered an apology.

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

That means that, if your constitution allows the chair to have a casting vote, they will also have a deliberative vote because they are a member. They therefore get a “second vote” the term often used for the casting vote.

The deliberative vote Must be taken at the same time that everyone else votes. You cannot put an issue to the vote, wait to see the result and then exercise your vote – that is not seen as fair or reasonable.

However, many people choose not to use their deliberative vote at all, preferring to remain impartial and only use it when the issue is tight and their vote will make a difference.

In this case, if there is a tie, and the chair has not yet exercised the deliberative vote, then the vote they then cast is their deliberative vote, not their casting vote.

A casting vote is only used once the deliberative vote has been exercised.

Also see the post on casting votes

Please Note: The author accepts no responsibility for anything which occurs directly or indirectly as a result of using any of the suggestions or procedures detailed in this blog. All suggestions and procedures are provided in good faith as general guidelines only and should be used in conjunction with relevant legislation, constitutions, rules, laws, by-laws, and with reasonable judgement.

Firstly, casting votes are sometimes called second votes. They occur when a vote is taken in a meeting and there is an equal number of votes in favour as there is against.

Does you constitution allow a casting vote?

The first thing you must know is whether your constitution allows a casting vote to be exercised by the person in the chair. You MUST find that out before anything.

Many organisations allow their chairman, president, presiding officer to have a deliberative vote – that’s the vote they get because they are a member, as well as a casting vote to be used when there is “an equality of votes” or a tie.

Here are the important issues.

1. The casting vote can only be used if the person presiding has already cast their deliberative vote.  So if the chair puts the issue to the vote, but does not vote him or herself and there is a tie, then the casting vote does not apply because they have not yet exercised their deliberative vote. (The deliberative vote should be used at the same time as everyone else votes – see the post on deliberative voting)

If, after they have exercise their deliberative vote there is a tie, then the casting vote can be exercised.

2.  This is the really tricky bit for some people. A wise chair will nearly always exercise their casting vote to “preserve the status quo“. That means they will vote so the situation does NOT change. In most circumstances, that means that they will vote against the proposal although some proposals are worded so that a vote in favour preserves the status quo.

I can almost hear some people saying WHY????

The answer is that by preserving the status quo, the issue is free to be raised again at a later meeting when there is more support. But the reason wise people vote this way is that if the casting vote is used to change something, then the decision has in reality been made by one person – the person in the chair. As many people are in favour as are against and it is not a sound decision.

I have read research that shows that decisions that are made upon a casting vote nearly always get reversed at a following meeting and the people who regularly use their casting votes to make changes, are often challenged for their position when they come up for election.

Now there will be times when the chair will use their casting vote to make a change. These are things where there has been considerable debate over many meetings and a decision simply has to be made.  These situations are rare but they do occur.

Bottom line is – use casting votes with great care.

The problem occurs when people who attend meetings are not familiar with the terminology and they often become confused if the term formal motion is used. The reason is that they belive that all motions are “formal” or “important” or “serious” and so they can be confused. 

That is why I always recommend that the term procedural motion is used because its meaning is obvious – it is procedural – the procedures.

The term “main motion” makes much more sense to most people as it is obvious what it means. I have therefore switched my terminology from “substantive” to “main”.

I suggest that meetings in Australia and New Zealand and Britain and Canada do the same as the technical term “substantive” is such an unusual word that is causes unnecessary confusion for people who may be having enough trouble just working out the meeting procedure game anyway.

So, use the term “main motion” and you will find a lot less people will be asking what you mean.

The answer depends on where in the agenda the meeting is at when the “next business” motion is moved.

The motion is sometimes confused with the  motion “that we proceed to the next item on the agenda.” If this motion is moved and carried, then the meeting moves to whatever item is next on the agenda, regardless of where, in the discussion on a main or substantive motion, the meeting is. In this case where the meeting may be discussing an amendment, the motion causes th meeting to abandon the motion and the amendment and move to the next item on the agenda.

The same IS NOT the case for the “next business” motion.

When the motion “That the meeting proceeds to the next business” is moved and carried, the following action occurs:

1. If it is moved on discussion of a main (or substantive) motion. In this case, once the procedural motion is carried, the main motion is abandoned and the meeting proceeds to the next item on the agenda. (This has the same effect as moving that the motion be withdrawn.)

2. If it is moved on discussion of an amendment. In this case the next business is actually the main motion and so the amendment is abandoned and the meeting proceeds to the main motion. (This has the same effect as moving that the amendment be withdrawn.)

3. If it is moved on discussion of a secondary amendment, often called an amendment to the amendment. In this case the next business is the primary amendment and so the secondary amendment is abandoned and the meeting proceeds to consider the amendment.