The Board Charter and Board Protocols are intended to provide a structure to ensure Directors:
- have a proper understanding of, and competence to deal with, the current and emerging issues for TAL; and
- can effectively review and challenge the performance of management and exercise independent judgment.
TAL's Constitution requires a minimum of three directors and a maximum of ten. Subject to these constraints, the Board can fix the number of directors to hold office.
The roles of Chairman and Managing Director are, and have always been, separate at TAL.
The Chairman's role is to lead and manage the Board so that it operates effectively, and to facilitate interaction between the Board and the Managing Director and Chief Executives of the business units. The Managing Director is responsible for the day-to-day leadership and management of the Group and is the primary representative of management to the Board.
A majority of the Board required to be independent Directors. That is, they are independent of management and free of any business or other relationship that could materially interfere with the exercise of their unfettered and independent judgement – for example, a relationship with a material TAL Australia customer, supplier, professional adviser or substantial shareholder.
Currently, five of the Directors are independent, namely: Peter Lewinsky, Ralph Pliner, Rob Thomas, Don Findlater and Fiona Balfour.
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