How Do You Measure Committee Effectiveness?

Committees. Committees come in all shapes and sizes. Committees vary in their effectiveness. 

If I had a friend who was going to put together a tool to assess a committee's effectiveness, what would she want to include in it? Ok, in the spirit of full disclosure,  I do have a friend and she has been tasked to develop a tool, really. Here is what I have gathered so far and could use your ideas for other ways to measure the effectiveness of a committee:

AN EFFECTIVE COMMITTEE WILL understand its purpose and effectively work toward its goals • have open communication among members • listen to all points of view and make decisions that work for all • not be dominated by one leader or member • strike a balance between group productivity and personal needs • establish a process to evaluate and make changes • provide an opportunity for members to work collaboratively • have access to information they need to make recommendations.

Any and all ideas are appreciated AND an actual tool will be recognized with a super honorable mention and many, many thanks!

Comments

[Rachel]

Have buy-in from the outside?

[Wally Bock]

Great question, Lisa. I come at it from a different position. The things you list are important, but they don't measure the effectiveness of the committee. A committee, presumably, is set up to accomplish something. The important thing to measure is how well they do that.

[RMSJr, SPHR]

Publish an agenda, publish minutes, compare the two, do they correlate?

Are action items identifed, with responsible parties assigned, deadlines designated, and follow-up documented through and to completion?

[Lisa Rosendahl]

Thanks to all for your comments!

[Bob Dill]

Limit the size; to not more than six members balanced as to gender, age, area of expertise, et.al.