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According to the NBB, Belgium has more than 85.000 public limited companies ("naamloze venootschappen" in Dutch or "sociétés anonymes belges" in French)^[1]. That means just as many board of directors, equivalent to at least 255.000 board members, since the board of a public limited company is usually composed of at least three board members. With great pride GUBERNA and KPMG present the "Board Member Handbook", that is focused on the board members of public limited company.

If you want to recruit and select non-executive or independent board members in a professional way, then the procedure to do so can be compared to that of top management in organisations. It has to do with determining organisational needs, sketching a candidate profile, comparing candidates, evaluating and eventually choosing the person who has added value for the board of directors and for the organisation.

The Charter of the GUBERNA Certified Director supports board members in carrying out their mandate, with respect for the rules of independence, competence, engagement, ethics and integrity.

GUBERNA has taken the initiative to develop a practical tool to help public organisations and those responsible for the selection of board members to fulfill high independence norms. As a knowledge centre for good governance GUBERNA develops tools that support organisations to make their board (more) professional.

With the financial support of the 'Vlaams Agentschap Ondernemen', VOKA East-Flanders and VOKA Halle-Vilvoorde and GUBERNA, the Institute for Board Members, launched the pilot project "Flemish SME's in Action" in 2010. During a two 2 year period, 200 SME's were convinced of the value that professionalisation of their board has on the growth and continuity of their organisation.

Every organisation needs to respect a set of relevant basic rules on corporate or good governance. Today, partly in view of its growing impact, the Flemish government too cannot escape the duty to develop a set of relevant recommendations for its externally autonomous agencies and to ensure that these 'public governance' principles are effectively applied in practice.

Niettegenstaande het feit dat de nationale en internationale corporate governance aanbevelingen een eerste houvast aanreiken voor het uitoefenen van de voorzittersrol, is er toch behoefte aan een concretere afbakening van de verantwoordelijkheden en bevoegdheden van de voorzitter van de Raad van Bestuur. Daarom heeft GUBERNA enkele jaren terug een werkgroep onder haar leden opgericht met als doel een in de praktijk bruikbare tool te ontwikkelen, die als toetssteen kan fungeren voor het invullen van de voorzittersfunctie.

As is stated in principle 7 of the Belgian Corporate Governance Code 2009 (and reproduced in the 2020 edition), “the company shall remunerate directors (and executives) fairly and responsibly”. The idea that board members should be remunerated has even been enshrined in the new Code on Companies and Associations, for all types of companies, listed or not. However, it is not easy for companies, even listed ones, to determine the fair remuneration of their directors.

The ACI Audit Committee Handbook is a comprehensive handbook for and about audit committees - a unique reference publication for board members and everyone that is associated with the audit committee.

Work has value! That is why the codes for good governance advise organisations to compensate non-executive board members. It is not a "one-size" fits all for organisations to determine the right remuneration. This is more the case for non-listed organisations who, in contract to listed companies, do not have any requirements concerning the publication of board member remuneration.