Becoming chair of trustees

[Whereohwhere2026]

I've been a charity trustee for about 18 months. The chair of governors is likely to step down in the next few months when his house sells and he moves away. I'm considering putting my name into the hat for chair. What are the things to be wary of? What questions should I ask? I'm always concerned over the legal/financial side of things as I'm not the best with numbers and I know the board are legally responsible. However, I love the charity and have a lot of skills that would make me a strong volunteer for the role.

Any advice or experience welcome.

Anyone?

I am a chair of trustees of a small charity. It probably depends on many things and we all have different experiences. I am well supported by our accountant and by a retired accountant acting as trustee. Do you have an efficient admin working for the charity? My downfall is tech. If you are committed to the cause and have a clear overview then you will be fine. Getting through meetings quickly and staying on point can be a challenge. Good luck !

Thank you. Yes there's strong admin.

I am a trustee of a small charity. To take the chair you have to be able to control a meeting, keep everyone on track and understand procedure. One of our past Chairmen couldn't and it was awful.

Get a copy of Citrine's "The ABC of Chairmanship". Really helps a lot.

I think being a good Chair is about managing people. Hopefully you already have good people in the key finance etc roles. So even though you have overall oversight you don't need detailed knowledge of each area. If you don't have good people in these roles then it's much harder. Are they reporting regularly and freely sharing information?

You need to be able to run an efficient meeting, stop people talking too much. Make sure people are following through on what they offered to do.
I guess you've got to know the personalities involved already which will help.

Depending on the charity do you have good safeguarding procedures in place?