The Board of Directors Election Process

Corporate Election Process

Electing a board of directors is a task most larger companies have to go through on a regular basis. The board are responsible for reviewing and guiding corporate strategy, assessing ways of managing risk, helping handle acquisitions, and the general Performance of the company.

Ensuring that your board of directors has been elected in line with your bylaws, that candidates are approved in good time and that the relationship with shareholders remains positive by avoiding contested election results are important tasks. Read on to learn more about the election process of a typical corporate board of directors' election.

Legal Guidelines

Bylaws establish how companies should be governed, how many members should make up the board of directors, the role of the directors and how elections should be conducted.

The current board of directors usually has the last say on who can stand as a candidate for the next board. This ensures that board members are sufficiently qualified and are able to work well with the other members. Members are then elected at the AGM by shareholders who have voting rights, or by members who have been given the voting rights of other shareholders.

Learn more about our registration platform where your members can register to vote in the upcoming election and delegate their voting rights to other members.

Equally important is to ensure that candidates are chosen in an open, transparent and efficient manner. Shareholders have the right to put forward candidates of their own at the AGM (in line with corporate bylaws). This is, however, a sign that the shareholders and board do not agree on the direction the company should be taking. Digitalizing the candidacy selection process can help enormously. Candidates can be nominated according to the parameters that you put in place and can be accepted or rejected in an open manner.

For more information about our nomination platform, click here.

Start now >

Documents for your Online Election

The most Important documents for your election are the ballot papers and the electoral roll. While ballot papers are somewhat of a given for an election, it is vital not to overlook the importance of keeping an updated electoral roll.

Most companies are required to keep a full list of all members, their contact details, and crucially for planning your election - their voting rights. While this may not be applicable to your particular company, many corporate election processes have different types of shares which denote different voting rights within the company.

However, the majority of corporations run on the basic guideline of one share, one vote. This helps to ensure that those with more of a stake in a company have more weight to their opinions but minority shareholders still get an input into the direction which the company is taking. 

If your bylaws permit voting outside of an AGM, you can combine live voting with either traditional voting procedures or an online election.

Online Voting & Security

The corporate election process usually revolves around the annual general meeting of shareholders.

Electing your board of directors online is the perfect way to ensure that results cannot be disputed, attendees are fully engaged in the voting process, and how many votes they possess. Our live voting platform is perfectly suited to live-voting at your AGM. You can set up ballots easily ahead of time, click preview to send it to your attendees' devices and finally start the election. Learn more about how live voting works, or request more information.

Our online elections will save you time, energy and money compared to traditional voting procedures and are better for the environment too! Avoid outdated election procedures like a show of hands and experience the security of voting online with POLYAS.

All of our elections run on a highly secure, certified election platform. If you would like to learn more about security, please click here.