Before Knowa
The scheme previously used a platform that couldn't give advisers the right access to key information in a timely or effective manner.
With Knowa
Matt runs board, subcommittee and internal meetings in Knowa, with access set within a single set of papers and first-draft minutes produced from the recording.
The challenge
Knowa was designed to support the pensions teams who keep a scheme running between board meetings - so trustees can concentrate on governance.
Matt Mills is one of them. Together with the team at Rock Pensions, he manages board meetings, adviser service levels, investment monitoring and complaint escalations for the large pension scheme they serve. He told us what can make that harder than it should be:
- If the Rock Pensions team needs to share board papers with an adviser, some of the content may be for trustees only. On a platform that can't tell user groups apart, that means producing and keeping track of redacted copies.
- In the meeting, discussions can be brought to a halt if the pack is hard to navigate. Trustees need clear papers and logical, indexed appendices, so the board can refer to a page and move on.
- Afterwards, the nuance of a discussion can be missed by minutes written up by hand. They also take time a team of four doesn't have to spare.
How Knowa helps
Matt describes the previous platform he used as 'having stood still' - and the difference with Knowa was visible straight away. He puts it down to Knowa being a platform built from the ground up to service how pension boards actually work.
Knowa now runs well beyond the quarterly board meeting, and supports Matt, the Rock Pensions team and the board they serve across a wide range of scenarios:
Access set within one set of papers
Matt sets permissions by user group inside a single set of board papers. Advisers see what their work needs, redacted where necessary, with no separate version to manage.
Minutes drafted from the recording
The team uploads the meeting recording and aligns it with the agenda. The draft minutes that come back capture points a manual write-up can miss.
Every meeting in one place
Board meetings, subcommittees and the team's own internal meetings all run through Knowa - each with a pack that's easy to find a way around.
Policies and training held securely
Policies and procedures sit in Knowa's secure repository. Training is shared the same way, with slides and recorded sessions trustees can watch when it suits them.
Works with the tools around it
Knowa can also integrate with external software - for example in the delivery of a member survey. Matt found the result smoother than anything his previous platform could offer.
“I upload the recording and line it up with the agenda. The draft minutes that come back pick up points I'd have missed writing them up by hand.”
Matt Mills, Rock Pensions
Matt and the Rock Pensions team work on Knowa alongside more than 4,000 trustees and 6,000 advisers. Book a demo to see how it would work for the scheme you run.
