Emma Clarke Executive mandate Chief of Staff Seat · USD 4,200 / month
90-day Chief of Staff mandate: Rowanbank Group
Emma Clarke runs the executive cadence. She has no budget, no team and no decision rights, on purpose.
Rowanbank's executive meets for three hours every Monday and decides very little. Actions are taken, nobody records them, and the same four topics have appeared on the agenda since June. This mandate installs a cadence and a decision record, and is explicit that Emma decides none of the decisions.
From 18 January, Emma owns the executive agenda, the decision log, action tracking and the board pack process. She holds no budget, manages no one, and takes no decision on behalf of any executive. Where she believes a decision is being avoided, she names it on the agenda rather than making it.
Document control
- Document number
- MAN-ROW-01
- Version
- 1.0
- Effective
- 18 January 2027
- Owner
- Emma Clarke, Fractional Chief of Staff
- Approved by
- Nadia Oyelowo, CEO
- Next review
- 19 April 2027
- Classification
- Confidential. Executive only
Why
What the diagnostic found
| Observed | Evidence |
|---|---|
| Three hour weekly executive meeting | 26 meetings reviewed. Mean duration 2h 52m |
| Few decisions are recorded | Nine recorded decisions across 26 meetings |
| Four topics recur without resolving | Pricing review, the Leeds office, the CRM migration and succession, since June |
| Actions are not tracked between meetings | No list exists. Actions are remembered or not |
| The board pack is assembled the weekend before | By the CEO and the finance director, every month |
| The executives like each other and work well | This is not a dysfunction problem |
A three hour meeting producing one recorded decision every three weeks is not a meeting, it is a standing conversation. The people are fine; the machinery around them does not exist.
Authority
What is and is not delegated
| Emma | The executive | |
|---|---|---|
| Sets the executive agenda | Yes | |
| Decides what is ready for a decision | Yes | |
| Maintains the decision log | Yes | |
| Tracks actions and chases owners | Yes | |
| Runs the board pack process | Yes | |
| Names a decision that is being avoided | Yes, on the agenda | |
| Takes any operational decision | No | Yes |
| Holds a budget | None | Yes |
| Manages anyone | Nobody | Yes |
| Speaks for an executive in their absence | No | Yes |
| Attends the board | Prepares, does not attend | Yes |
Plan
What the 90 days installs
| Week | Change | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Decision log started | Every decision, owner, date and reason. Nothing else changes yet |
| 2 | Agenda published Friday, papers with it | No paper, no agenda slot. The single highest leverage rule here |
| 2 | Action list, reviewed first at every meeting | Ten minutes. Most of the value of the mandate sits in this line |
| 3 | Meeting cut to 90 minutes | Possible only because of weeks 1 and 2 |
| 4 | The four recurring topics each get an owner and a decision date | They stop being topics and become decisions with deadlines |
| 6 | Board pack process moves to a two week rhythm | Assembled progressively, not on a Sunday |
| 10 | Executive reviews its own cadence | Emma facilitates and takes no view on the outcome |
Measures
How this gets judged on 19 April
| Measure | Today | What good looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Recorded decisions per month | About 1 | 6 or more |
| Meeting length | 2h 52m | 90 minutes |
| Actions tracked and closed | Not tracked | Tracked, with a closure rate |
| The four recurring topics | Open since June | Decided, or with a dated plan |
| Board pack assembled on a weekend | Every month | Never |
| Decisions taken by Emma | n/a | Zero. This is a measure |
The last row is a real measure and will be asked about at the review. If the answer is anything other than zero, the mandate has drifted into the failure mode in clause 2 and should be corrected rather than celebrated.
Document control
Revision history
| Version | Date | Author | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1.0 | 9 January 2027 | Emma Clarke | Agreed and signed. Effective 18 January 2027. |
| 0.2 | 6 January 2027 | Emma Clarke | Draft. Zero decisions taken added as an explicit measure after the CEO asked how we would know if the role had drifted. |
| 0.1 | 3 January 2027 | Emma Clarke | First draft, from 26 executive meeting records and interviews with all five executives. |