The 2025 Charity Governance Code sets out eight principles that together describe what genuinely good governance looks like. Not just the financial controls, but the culture, the values, the diversity, the decision-making and the way a board reflects on and improves its own performance. It is the most comprehensive version of the Code to date, and it is worth every trustee getting familiar with it.
The Code is voluntary, built on an ‘apply or explain’ approach, which means it meets charities where they are rather than demanding overnight perfection. But whether your charity is large or small, newly formed or long established, these principles are the benchmark for a well-governed board.
Here is what each one means in practice.
Foundation Principle
Before anything else, trustees need to understand what they have signed up to. This first principle is all about the basics such as knowing your role, understanding your legal duties, and taking the time to get properly up to speed with the charity you are there to govern.
It sounds obvious, but it’s surprising how many boards skip the induction, assume everyone knows what they are doing, and then wonder why things go wrong. The foundation principle asks trustees to be curious, to stay informed about regulatory changes, and to be honest about any conflicts of interest. None of that is optional. It is the minimum standard from which everything else follows.
You know it’s working when trustees are genuinely engaged, when conflicts of interest are declared openly, and when new trustees receive a proper induction rather than being handed a bundle of papers and wished good luck.
Organisational Purpose
Why does your charity exist? Who is it for? What does it actually do? These might sound like questions with obvious answers, but the second principle asks boards to be continually clear about them, not just at founding, but as the world around them changes.
Mission drift is real. Boards can find themselves funding activities that feel vaguely connected to their purpose without ever properly checking the fit. This principle asks boards to set a long-term vision, agree shorter-term aims, and regularly revisit whether the charity’s activities are still aligned with why it exists.
The best-governed charities can point to measurable impact. They can show how what they do connects to the difference they are making. That kind of clarity does not happen accidentally. It takes intentional, ongoing work from the board.
Leadership
Governing a charity and running a charity is a distinction that trips up a lot of trustees. Leadership in the governance sense is about setting direction, establishing culture, and creating the conditions in which the whole organisation can thrive. The day-to-day management is for staff and volunteers.
This principle asks boards to be clear about roles, to respect the boundary between governance and operations, and to actively champion the charity’s values from the top. The chair plays a particularly important role here, not just chairing meetings, but helping the board work together as a team and building a strong working relationship with senior staff.
When leadership is working well, everyone in the organisation knows what the board is there for, trusts it to make good decisions, and feels safe to raise concerns.
Ethics and Culture
This one is relatively new as a standalone principle, and it’s a welcome addition. It asks boards to think carefully about the culture they are creating, not just the policies they have written, but whether the day-to-day reality of how the charity behaves actually reflects its stated values.
That includes how complaints are handled. How failures are responded to. Whether there is genuine psychological safety for staff and volunteers to speak up. And whether the board itself models the kind of behaviour it expects from everyone else.
Ethics and culture also means being open. Sharing what has gone wrong as well as what has gone right, being transparent about how decisions are made, and making sure there are proper policies in place around safeguarding, whistleblowing, and conflicts of interest. Values on a wall are not enough. This principle asks boards to live them.
Decision Making
Every trustee has sat through a board meeting that ran out of time before it got to the thing that actually mattered. That is a governance failure, even if no one calls it that in the moment.
The fifth principle is about making sure the board is focused on the right things, has the right information, and makes decisions in a clear, structured, and documented way. That means well-designed agendas, papers that give trustees what they need to make informed decisions, and a scheme of delegation that makes clear who is authorised to decide what.
It also means tracking decisions over time. Can the board look back at what it decided six months ago and understand why? Can it monitor whether those decisions are being implemented? Good decision-making is not just about the moment of the vote. It is about the whole cycle of information, deliberation, decision, and review.
Managing Resources and Risks
Charities exist to do good. But they can only do good if they are financially sustainable and properly managed. This principle asks boards to take responsibility for the charity’s resources and to have a clear-eyed view of its risks.
That means regular, accurate financial reporting, a reserves policy and a risk register that is genuinely used rather than filed and forgotten. It also means that there should be proper oversight of any properties, investments, or subsidiaries, and a board that is willing to ask the uncomfortable questions about whether the charity’s current model is sustainable.
Managing risk does not mean being risk-averse. Some of the most important work charities do requires taking bold positions or working in challenging environments. But it does mean understanding the risks, having the right controls in place, and being confident that the charity is not one unexpected event away from crisis.
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
This principle asks boards not just to be diverse, but to actively work to understand and address the inequalities that affect their charity, their beneficiaries, and their own boardroom.
It is easy for boards to say they value diversity. It is harder to actually examine where the barriers to participation are, to actively recruit trustees from different backgrounds, and to create an environment where all voices are genuinely heard and valued rather than just tolerated.
The 2025 Code strengthens this principle further, asking boards to consider the absence of certain voices in their discussions, to reflect on how their ways of working might unintentionally exclude people, and to share publicly how they are progressing against their EDI aims. Diversity makes boards better. This principle asks charities to treat it as a governance priority, not just a communications one.
Board Effectiveness
The final principle might be the most important one to take seriously, because it is the one boards are most tempted to skip. It asks boards to regularly review how they are working, to invest in trustee development, and to be honest about where they need to improve.
That means skills audits, succession planning and annual reviews of individual trustees and the chair. Open, structured conversations about how the board is functioning. And a genuine commitment to learning and development, not as a one-off induction but as an ongoing part of being a trustee.
A board that never asks how it is doing will not get better. This principle is the Code’s way of making sure improvement is built into the governance cycle, not left to chance.
How Convene Helps You Live the Code
Reading about the eight principles is one thing. Building a board that genuinely lives them is another. That is where having the right tools makes a real difference.
Convene is a board portal built to support governance at every level. It brings everything your board needs into one secure, intuitive platform with agendas, board papers, voting, document management, actions, audit trails, and more. It is designed so that good governance is not an extra administrative burden. It is just how your board works.
Here is how Convene supports each principle in practice:
Foundation Principle and Decision Making
All board papers, minutes, and governance documents are stored securely in one place. Trustees can access everything they need before, during, and after meetings. No more chasing PDFs over email or wondering which version of the report was actually discussed. Decisions are documented with full audit trails, so the board can always track what was decided and why.
Organisational Purpose and Leadership
Convene’s agenda-building and scheduling tools help the chair design meetings that focus on what matters most. With rolling schedules, action tracking, and the ability to monitor progress against decisions, boards can stay focused on their mission rather than getting lost in administration.
Ethics and Culture
Secure document storage means policies, declarations, and governance records are all held in one place. Full audit trails mean that the board can demonstrate its ethical standards with evidence, not just assertions. Every decision, every vote, every key communication is on record.
Managing Resources and Risks
Secure document storage and version control mean financial reports, risk registers, and board papers are always accessible and up to date. For dispersed boards, real-time voting and integrated video conferencing mean every trustee can participate fully without compromising security or accountability.
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
Convene is accessible across all devices and browsers, with an intuitive design that lowers the barrier to participation for trustees who may be less confident with technology. Remote and hybrid participation tools mean that geography, disability, or caring responsibilities need not prevent anyone from contributing fully to board life.
Board Effectiveness
Board assessment features mean the annual board review can be conducted digitally, with results securely stored and acted upon. Trustee performance tracking, development planning, and succession support all sit within the same platform, making it easier for boards to take their own improvement seriously.
Ready to govern with confidence?
Good governance does not happen by accident. It takes the right processes, the right culture, and yes, the right tools. If your board is ready to take its governance seriously, Convene is ready to help.
Book a demo with the Convene team today and see what a board portal built with governance at its heart can really do for your charity.
This blog is based on the 2025 edition of the Charity Governance Code, published by the Good Governance Steering Group. The Code applies to charities in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland and operates on a voluntary ‘apply or explain’ basis. For the full Code and supporting resources, visit charitygovernancecode.org.
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