Board Meeting Software: Helping You Prepare for Important Negotiations

Corporate board management can become a complicated and time-consuming process if not handling it smartly.

That’s why modern companies and boards of directors choose virtual board portals for managing board processes and communication.

Learn what board portal software is and how it facilitates the decision-making process by reading the article below.

What is board portal software?

Board portal software, or a virtual boardroom, is a digital platform designed to make board meetings more straightforward and effective and improve overall corporate governance. With such a tool, you can plan meetings, share documents and meeting minutes, communicate with board members, and analyze meeting results.

Virtual boardrooms allow board members to reach board meeting materials at any time and from any device and work on the required tasks in a timely manner.

Advantages of implementing board management software

Here’s what you get when implementing board document management software:

• Improved document management. You can easily manage large volumes of corporate documents, create meeting minutes and agendas, and distribute meeting materials in just a few clicks.
• Enhanced communication between board members. In-built communication tools enable fast interaction between board members, which keeps everyone on the same page.
• Better governance. Directors can save their time and decide on important issues in a timely manner thanks to the in-built boardroom services that automate the decision-making process.
• Round-the-clock availability. All board members can reach a virtual boardroom anytime and from anywhere.
• Enhanced security. Board management software providers offer end-to-end security processes that allow for keeping users’ data private. The majority of boardrooms are at least ISO 27001 certified and SOC 2 compliant.
• Efficient meeting management. With the help of a board portal, administrators can easily create, schedule, and hold meetings in one place and in a paperless environment.

How to choose a board portal for your company?

Below are general recommendations for selecting a virtual boardroom for your company.

• Define your business needs and expectations. Some boardroom providers offer a basic set of services enabling only board communication, while others focus on the overall corporate governance. Decide what your company’s needs are.

• Think of the features you’ll need. The next step is to consider what you plan to use board management software for. It can be a simple tool for corporate documents storing and board communications. Or, it can be a fully-fledged service for pre-, in-, and post-meeting activities.

• Pick up several vendors and test them. After you clearly understand what you expect from a board portal, you can choose a few providers that correspond to your requirements and try them out. The majority of vendors provide free demo sessions or trial periods, allowing you to test the software before buying a subscription to make sure it’s what you need.

• Discover what security measures vendors take. Considering the fact that you’ll need to share highly confidential corporate information via a boardroom, it’s important to make sure your data is well protected.

• Read user feedback. The best way to know how efficient a particular board portal will be is to check board meeting software reviews of real customers. This way, you can find out what user experience to expect from the vendor.

Top 13 features to look for in a board portal

All virtual boardroom vendors provide different features. If you’re looking for a reliable board portal software, expect at least the following features or their modifications:

1. Meeting manager. It lets you schedule meetings, create an agenda, send invitations, distribute pre-meeting materials, and create meeting minutes.
2. Dashboard. With its help, you can view all the files, calendars, agendas, reports, and other important meeting documents in a homepage mode.
3. Calendar. This tool creates meetings, adds agendas, notifies meeting participants about the scheduled event, and sends invitations.
4. Document manager. It comprises various features that help you to manage large volumes of data: from drag-n-drop upload that uploads all files in a single click to auto-indexing that structures folders in a logical order.
5. Communication tools. This tool enables all board members to communicate inside a boardroom.
6. Video integrations. With such integrations as Zoom, you can conduct board meetings without any extra software.
7. Task manager. With its help, you can create tasks, assign them to board members, and track progress.
8. Permissions manager. Boardroom administrators can set up access permissions to every file so that only authorized users can view them.
9. Reporting options. Reporting features allow for monitoring the users’ activity inside the boardroom and tracking meeting attendance.
10. Voting tools. With their help, board members can approve and vote on budgets, resolutions, and other important company decisions anytime and from anywhere.
11. Customization options. These allow giving a board portal your company’s look and feel.
12. Surveys. This tool lets you create surveys and questionnaires with the help of templates, customize questions, track progress, and send reminders to all board members.
13. Electronic signatures. With the help of e-signatures, the board of directors can sign important documents or contracts anytime and anywhere without a need for physical presence, which significantly facilitates decision-making.

Summing up

Board portals were created to significantly improve corporate governance, enhance communication among board members, and facilitate decision-making. With the features listed above, they

enable efficient meeting management, improved communication, and enhanced security.

When choosing a boardroom for your company, pay attention to its features, security measures, and real user reviews to make sure it fits your company’s requirements.