Board of Trustees Meeting: Thursday 7th May 2026 at 15:00

[drjwbaker]

Board of Trustees Meeting: Thursday 7th May 2026 14:00 UTC

Date: Thursday 7th May 2026
Time: 14:00 UTC
Zoom link + passcode (see email)
Chair: @drjwbaker
Members: @acrymble @adamfarquhar @amsichani @jenniferisasi @rivaquiroga
Publishing Manager: @anisa-hawes
Minutes: @anisa-hawes
Minutes of the last meeting: 2026-02-19_BoT.md

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Hello all,

In line with Trustees' duties, as summarised in Section 2 of The Essential Trustee Guidance, please circulate relevant documents or add new agenda Items in advance of the meeting so that all attendees have sufficient time to prepare their thoughts. Thank you for committing energy to your role, and for actively participating in our discussions.

Agenda

1. Apologies [AH] {2 mins}
2. Approval of Minutes from last meeting & actions status [AH] {5 mins}
3. ProgHist Directors administration (e.g., changes of address) [JB] {2 mins}
4. Publishing Manager's Report [AH] {15 mins}
5. ProgHist Ltd Trustee 'search' [JB] {5 mins}

Our priorities for Board recruitment in order are:

1. Bring in Trustees with skills relating to fundraising in response to the 2025/26 Business Plan and new Vision for ProgHist Ltd.
2. Bring in Trustees whose experiences are not principally in humanities academia in order to strengthen our capacity to run and grow ProgHist Ltd.
3. Shift away from having a majority of Trustees based in the UK in response to the Programming Historian Diversity Policy and the benefits of having a plurality of perspectives on the Board.

Note that we also discussed identifying individuals from within the editorial teams whose addition to the Board would ensure our work adequately represents ongoing work.
Our actions as Board members and Publishing Manager are to:
1.>

1. Keep these priorities in mind when - either in-person or online - attending networking events, interacting with sector colleagues, and attending talks, seminars, or workshops.
2. Feel empowered to discuss the work on ProgHist Ltd and the Board with individuals who may meet one or more of our priority areas for Board recruitment, and to gauge - informally - their likely interest in joining the Board.
3. Report any such conversations to the Board and provide a brief (3-4 sentence) biography of the person in question. If the Board deem the potential candidate worth consideration, we will schedule - as appropriate - follow on meetings and a vote at a subsequent Trustees meeting.

These priorities and actions will remain in place until December 2026 or until Board recruitment is deemed to have met our operational needs, whichever occurs sooner.

6. Trustee Tasks: updates, milestones, and refresh {5 mins}
   a. Publishing Manager Line Management [RQ]
7. Chair's highlight from The Essential Trustee [JB] {10 mins}
   • 7. Manage your charity’s resources responsibly
   • "You must act responsibly, reasonably and honestly. This is sometimes called the duty of prudence. Prudence is about exercising sound judgement.". This includes the responsiblities that we manage risks, support budgeting, and give our staff and volunteers a clear steer on what we want them to do. In practical terms for us and how we are structured this means scrunitising the Publishing Manager's Reports (to BoT and AGM), Treasurer's Reports, and any official documents we produce (e.g. Annual Reports for Companies House), and - where appropriate - offering challenge questions. This is responsiblity of all Trustees.
8. Any Other Business {5 mins}
9. Date of next meeting {1 min}
   a. TBC

Note, the remit of the Board of Directors is restricted to the terms of ProgHist Ltd, which - broadly speaking - supports the the financial and legal business of The Programming Historian and its Members (that is, the Editorial Board #1405 (comment)).

Notes

Per our Articles of Association (click 'View PDF' link) and gov.uk notes on running a company a few notes in terms of procedure for the meeting:

• our quorum is 3 (Article 9.1) and our max size 7 (Article 13)
• we vote, and in split decisions the chair has the casting vote (Article 10.1)
• we need to keep records of decisions (Article 12) and resolutions (GovUK)**