What’s on the agenda? Highlights from Members Board June 2024
From advocating for our new future-focused CA syllabus to discussing plans for an AI support hub, find out what was on the agenda at the recent meeting of ICAS Members Board.
Members Board provides strategic direction, guidance, oversight, and challenge to all the work we undertake to support and engage our members and students.
The Board last met at CA House on Wednesday 19 June to discuss a packed agenda of topics.
Developing an AI support hub
At each meeting, the Board hear the key points on the work of Council, Oversight Board. They also hear from Board members who sit on other ICAS committees, panels and groups. This all helps to ensure knowledge sharing, awareness and connectivity.
David Wilson CA highlighted the ICAS Sustainability Panel workplan which is aligned to the three themes of advocacy and influence, learning and training, and leading by example. Iain McMichael CA shared news that the ICAS AI Working Group are developing an AI Hub to support and sign post AI content to members and students, and have identified several external partners to collaborate with on AI.
The Board also shared their commitment and enthusiasm to work on points of commonality with Practice Board following an informative update on the Practice Support strategy and vision led by David Menzies CA, ICAS Director of Practice.
Advocating for our new CA syllabus
Elsewhere, the Board engaged in a session on why the new CA syllabus is attractive and appealing to training firms. Built on the three key themes of ethics, sustainability and technology, the syllabus has greater flexibility of delivery, new electives, more choice, and geography is not a barrier to train. Board members were asked to be advocates for the CA qualification, and those in organisations that train CAs shared positive feedback relating to the speed at which recent assessment results were fed back to students.
The CA Summit is back for 2024
Next on the agenda was the development of the CA Summit 2024, which is planned for November. The Board provided invaluable feedback on the plans, with support for the event topics, and putting forward speaker ideas.
A key part of the Members Board workplan is the member engagement and value strategy work, where the Board discussed the development of topic-based member networks. Earlier this year, ICAS launched the Black Members Network and Sustainability Business Network, and the Board explored proposals and helped shape the direction of potential future networks.
The oversight of Area Networks and International Communities remains a priority for the Board, to ensure that ICAS supports and retains its national and international communities and creates better connectivity between the Area Networks, international ambassadors and Members Board.
Insights from the ICAS Foundation
The Board were delighted to hear from the Director and the Chair of the ICAS Foundation, Sanjay Singh, and Norman Murray CA, who provided valuable insight on the Foundation’s strategy. Board members were highly enthusiastic about the work of the Foundation, providing practical suggestions on improving existing methods of engagement and new ways to reach out to members and encourage donations.
Saying goodbye to two ‘role-model’ members
This meeting was particularly notable as it was the last for Katherine Ritchie CA and Rhona Thomson CA, who both completed their second and final terms as Board members, each having sat on the Board since July 2018.
At the start of the meeting, Members Board Chair, Michael Kay CA, thanked both Katherine and Rhona for their time, direction, guidance and commitment, describing them as ‘role models’.
The Board will next meet on Wednesday 25 September.
Would you be interested in getting involved with Members Board?
Being a member of the Board provides an opportunity to make a positive contribution to the work of ICAS and help shape the member engagement strategy. It’s also a great way to network with CAs from across a variety of sectors and backgrounds and gain experience of being part of an influential ICAS board.
The Board is governed by ICAS Council. To ensure the composition of the committee reflects the diversity of the changing membership demographics we are looking for members from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. We particularly welcome applications from ethnically diverse people and other minority groups.
