Achieving balance in HE governance

Senior consultant Daniel Taylor considers the roles of university senate, executive and council in the tripartite model

In a time of heightened scrutiny and challenge for the higher education sector, universities need governance systems that are clear in purpose, aligned in operation, and robust in assurance.

University governance gets its unique flavour from its core academic purpose. A university can’t be well governed in the absence of strong academic leadership and oversight, alongside that of other key areas such as financial and legal.

At the heart of the higher education governance model sit three core entities: the council, the executive, and the senate (or academic board). Each has a distinct and crucial role. But it is the relationship between them – not simply their internal functioning – that is such a determinant of whether a university is governed effectively and with legitimacy.

So often in GGi’s work with higher education providers, we encounter governance arrangements where the roles of council, senate, and executive are not clearly defined and, even more often, where the interfaces and interdependencies between them are underdeveloped or misunderstood.

This article explores that relationship and its importance and ultimately sets out a vision for the ideal role of senate, contrasted with its counterparts, offering a framework for how these bodies should interact to promote accountability, academic integrity, and institutional success.

Context

One of the distinctive features of university governance is what Professor Michael Shattock and others have termed the bicameral model: the two chambers of the council or board (responsible for institutional oversight) and the senate or academic board (responsible for academic governance).

Alongside the executive, which leads operational and managerial delivery, these bodies form the core architecture of governance in higher education providers. Their form and function differ across institutional types, with senates in older universities often conceived and constituted quite differently from those in newer institutions, for example.

The tripartite model - council, senate, executive - did not emerge in a vacuum. It is the product of decades of reform, reflection, and recalibration. In a necessarily simplified account of a complex history:

• The Robbins Report (1963) laid the foundation for mass higher education, championing academic autonomy and the primacy of scholarly standards. It offered a staunch defence of the independence and authority of senates.
• The Jarrett Report (1985) shifted the focus toward efficiency and accountability, advocating for stronger board oversight and positioning the vice-chancellor more explicitly as a chief executive, aligning university governance more closely with corporate governance norms.
• The Further and Higher Education Act (1992) brought polytechnics into the university sector, formalising governance responsibilities. Many of these institutions established academic boards without the deep historical and philosophical roots of traditional senates.
• The Higher Education and Research Act (2017) and the emergence of regulators such as the Office for Students (OfS) have since intensified the focus on institutional performance, student outcomes, and public accountability.

These developments have reshaped the roles and relationships within university governance. Councils have become more assertive in oversight, senates have sometimes seen their influence diluted, and vice-chancellors have come to operate as chief executives. Yet despite – or perhaps because of – these shifts, the need for clarity, balance, and mutual respect between the three components has never been greater.

These ‘three legs of the stool’ exist in a spectrum of different sub-sector and organisation-specific contexts and constructs. The UK higher education sector is a patchwork of institutional types – from ancient universities, through post-92s to privates – each with its own historical precedents, customs, and governance derivations. Within this diversity, governance structures and nomenclature vary widely, and many institutions exhibit their own eclectic quirks.

It is quite common for these core components of governance to be reviewed or restructured in isolation, even though they derive their authority from the same governing documents. Unless these reviews are done with a mindfulness about the function of the system as a whole and the integrations and interconnectedness, this is an unhelpful practice.

Over time, as policy, legislation, and regulatory pressures have changed the nature and demands of higher education governance for all providers, a valid and pressing question arises: how, notwithstanding the subtle (and not-so-subtle) institutional differences, can the three legs of the stool – council, senate, and executive – work together most effectively?

Because ultimately, it is not just the strength of each component that determines governance effectiveness, it is how well they integrate, interconnect, and align in purpose. So…

Council / board: strategic mind and guardian of institutional accountability

Before diving into the council / board’s responsibilities, it’s worth noting how its role has expanded over time. Once primarily concerned with financial stewardship, councils now operate as strategic overseers, with growing expectations around oversight of both academic and non-academic matters and regulatory compliance.

The council / board (henceforth simply ‘council’) is the university’s governing body, responsible in law for the institution’s affairs. It carries ultimate accountability for finance, resources, compliance, and the sustainability of the institution.

Council must respect senate’s academic sovereignty while ensuring that governance structures deliver coherent oversight. It cannot provide effective academic assurance on its own, nor should it abdicate responsibility entirely to the executive. A strong and independent senate is council’s ally, not its rival.

In an ideal model, council should:

• set institutional strategy, working with the executive and informed by senate on academic matters
• approve the university’s mission, vision and long-term plans
• hold the executive to account for all aspects of performance
• ensure effective risk management, including academic risks escalated via senate
• receive academic assurance from senate, rather than relying solely on the executive
• promote and uphold good governance, ensuring that structures and accountabilities are clearly understood.

Quite often in the organisations we review, the council is underdeveloped in its strategic role. A common feature is that assurance isn’t organised strategically, on either non-academic or academic areas.

Council must also maintain a clear and structured oversight of the executive’s operational governance. It should ensure that executive authority is exercised within the boundaries set by institutional strategy and governance frameworks, and that performance is transparently reported and scrutinised. While the executive leads delivery, council must remain actively engaged, not in operational detail, but in holding the executive to account for outcomes, risks, and alignment with the university’s mission. A well-functioning council provides both challenge and support, enabling the executive to lead effectively while ensuring that governance remains robust and legitimate.

Senate: guardian of academic standards and integrity

The senate is – or should be – the sovereign academic body of the university. Its core purpose is to uphold academic standards, oversee academic strategy, and ensure the integrity of teaching, research, and the student experience. In many institutions, the role has been eroded, reduced to advisory status or bypassed in strategic decision-making, duplicated by new ‘academic assurance’ or ‘student experience’ committees of council, or in their conceptualisation as a committee of council.

In an ideal model, senate should:

• set and approve academic strategy, ensuring alignment with the institution’s mission and values
• oversee academic quality and standards, including curriculum, assessment and academic policies
• provide assurance on academic performance, drawing on internal data and external benchmarks (e.g. TEF, NSS, REF)
• monitor student achievement, experience and compliance with academic benchmarks and regulatory requirements, including Office for Students (OfS) conditions
• scrutinise academic risks, such as poor performance against agreed benchmarks, grade inflation, or non-compliance with sector standards
• hold the academic executive to account for delivery of agreed academic outcomes and the quality of provision
• report to council on matters of academic assurance.

Senate must not be reduced to a ceremonial body or a rubber stamp for executive proposals. Nor should it be an unwieldy debating forum. Nor, as I have said above, should it be conceived as a committee of council. It should be a structured, independent, and informed space for deliberation, oversight, and stewardship of the academic mission.

Executive: guardian of delivery and performance

The executive’s role has evolved significantly, particularly with the rise of performance metrics and regulatory scrutiny. Vice-chancellors now operate with a remit akin to corporate CEOs but within a completely different context. This shift hasn’t always been accompanied by the necessary modernisation and recalibration of some parts of the governance – as I talk about in my article about rethinking academic governance – with robust checks and balances on what is a significant concentration of power and authority.

The executive is responsible for the day-to-day management and operational delivery of the university’s academic and corporate strategy.

In an ideal model, the executive should:

• deliver the academic and institutional strategies as approved by senate and council, respectively
• lead academic and operational planning, subject to approval and oversight
• manage staff, finances, and infrastructure in line with agreed goals
• ensure regulatory compliance across both academic and corporate domains
• report to senate on academic delivery, and to council on institutional performance
• facilitate effective governance, providing clear, timely information and supporting the flow of accountability.

In a well-functioning governance system, the executive should not be the dominant force but a responsive and accountable partner. The executive's role is not to dominate governance, but to implement the vision and strategy agreed by the council. Its authority must be exercised within the boundaries set by institutional strategy and governance frameworks, with performance transparently reported and scrutinised. Strong executives welcome challenge – from both senate and council – to enhance institutional quality and legitimacy.

To foster a healthy governance culture, the executive should:

• champion transparency: provide timely, accurate, and relevant information to both council and senate, enabling informed oversight and challenge
• facilitate structured engagement: ensure that governance bodies are not just informed but meaningfully involved in shaping and reviewing strategic decisions
• model accountability: welcome scrutiny from both council and senate, recognising that robust challenge enhances legitimacy and institutional quality
• support academic integrity: respect senate’s authority over academic matters and avoid bypassing or duplicating its functions through parallel structures
• enable strategic alignment: work collaboratively to ensure that academic and institutional strategies are coherent and mutually reinforcing.

Executives who embrace these principles help to create a governance environment that is not only effective but trusted, where delivery is matched by legitimacy, and performance by purpose.

Clarifying interdependencies

The three entities – council, executive, and senate – must be distinct in role but aligned in purpose. Each has core responsibilities that cannot be substituted by the others. To avoid duplication or drift, it’s essential to understand how these bodies interlock. The following table outlines their distinct but complementary responsibilities:

This balance is delicate. Confusion, duplication, or overreach leads to ineffective governance and institutional drift. But when roles are respected and boundaries are clear, the system works: senate provides academic assurance, council provides institutional oversight, and the executive delivers performance.

Why this matters

At a technical level, the clarity of roles between council, senate, and executive is not just a matter of good governance, it is foundational to legal accountability, regulatory compliance, and effective institutional decision-making.

• Regulatory accountability: The Office for Students (OfS) requires governing bodies (i.e. council/board) to receive assurance on academic quality and standards, in line with its accountability for the legitimate and proper functioning as a provider against the registration conditions. This assurance cannot be credibly delivered without a robust and independent academic governance structure (i.e. senate). If the council relies solely on executive reporting, it risks breaching its statutory duties under the OfS regulatory framework.
• Oversight and scrutiny: Effective scrutiny depends on structured information flows and clearly delineated responsibilities. For example, academic risks (e.g. grade inflation, non-compliance with sector benchmarks) must be escalated from senate to council, not just filtered or diluted through executive channels.
• Decision-making integrity: Strategic decisions, such as or restructuring faculties, require input from both academic and corporate governance perspectives. If the executive dominates or bypasses senate, decisions may lack academic legitimacy. Conversely, if senate overreaches into operational matters, agility and coherence suffer.
• Clear delegation and exercise of power and due accountability: A well-defined scheme of delegation is essential to codify who holds authority over what. Ambiguities here can lead to decisions being made at inappropriate levels, undermining both accountability and effectiveness. In general HEI schemes of delegation tend to be lighter in detail on senate authority and delegation.

Where things often go wrong

In our experience, HE governance structures often falter due to misalignment or confusion between the three entities. Some of the most frequent and technically significant issues include:

• Blurred regulatory assurance pathways: In some institutions, academic assurance is routed primarily through the executive reporting (substantively the VC’s report), bypassing senate. This undermines the integrity of assurance and creates a false sense of oversight and weakens the link between council and senate, and council’s sight and understanding of senate’s work. This creates a compliance risk, as council cannot demonstrate independent oversight of academic standards, a core regulatory expectation.
• Clarity on assurance: Many HE institutions haven’t got in place an assurance framework, clarifying, organising and setting clear expectations around the key areas of assurance linked to strategy and regulatory compliance, covering both academic and non-academic areas of governance. A key part of this is mapping assurance responsibilities clearly across governance structure. A proper assurance map should show who originates, who scrutinises, and who receives each type of assurance: academic, financial, regulatory, reputational. These aren’t always in place.
• Confusion around accountability, scrutiny and delegations: Delegated authorities are often not optimally documented or fully misunderstood. Schemes of delegation often lack granularity. For example, decisions about closure of an academic area may sit ambiguously between senate, executive committees, and council, leading to duplication, delay, or decisions made without proper scrutiny, or they may be delegated to the executive without clear thresholds for senate or council involvement. This creates ambiguity around who owns the academic impact and who is accountable for institutional risk. The relationship between senate and the executive, particularly around holding to account, is often misunderstood.
• Dual reporting ambiguity: Academic executives (e.g. PVCs for education or research) may report informally to both senate and council, but without clear lines of accountability.
• Uncodified escalation pathways: Academic risks (e.g. for English context non-compliance with OfS conditions B1–B5) may be identified at faculty or departmental level but lack a codified route to senate and then to council. Without formal escalation protocols, risks may be diluted or delayed, leading to regulatory breaches or reputational damage.
• Overlapping or conflicting terms of reference: Governance bodies sometimes operate with outdated or overlapping terms of reference. For instance, both senate and council, or even the executive board, or all three, may claim oversight of academic strategy, leading to confusion over final authority. This can result in dual approvals, policy reversals, or strategic drift.
• Committee proliferation and duplication: The creation of parallel structures – such as council-level ‘academic assurance’ committees – can undermine senate’s role, leading to duplication, confusion, and erosion of academic governance legitimacy.
• Cultural misalignment: Even with formal structures in place, poor relationships or lack of mutual respect between council, senate, and executive can derail governance. For example, if senate is perceived as ceremonial or obstructive, its input may be marginalised, weakening academic oversight.
• Governance capture by executive: In some cases, the executive dominates both council and senate agendas, shaping the flow of information and framing decisions. This can lead to governance capture, where scrutiny is performative rather than substantive. Indicators include:

1. executive-led committees duplicating senate functions
2. council papers lacking independent academic input
3. senate agendas driven by executive priorities rather than academic deliberation.

• Failure to distinguish assurance from management reporting: Council often receives performance dashboards that are management reports rather than assurance products. Without independent validation from senate, these reports may lack the critical scrutiny needed for governance-level assurance. This is particularly risky in areas like student outcomes, TEF metrics, or REF performance.

• Inconsistent governance reviews: Governance effectiveness reviews frequently focus on council alone, neglecting senate and executive structures. This creates blind spots in the system and fails to test the tripartite balance. A comprehensive review should assess:
• role clarity and authority boundaries
• information flows and assurance pathways
• cultural dynamics and behavioural norms.

Ideal joint protocol between senate and council

Alongside setting an academic assurance framework, councils and senates should co-develop and work to a joint protocol to support an effective working relationship between them. This joint protocol is more than a procedural document; it should be a cultural commitment to collaboration and mutual respect. The following principles and mechanisms can help embed that ethos:

Principles:

• Respect for each body's sovereign areas of responsibility.
• Transparent and timely information flows.
• Constructive challenge and shared commitment to institutional mission.

Information flows:

• Senate submits academic assurance reports directly to council.
• Council provides feedback on the sufficiency of assurance and requests further information as needed.
• Joint annual meeting to discuss alignment of academic and institutional strategy.

Decision-making authority:

• Senate has final authority over academic standards, curricula, degree regulations, and academic policies, without council ratification.
• Council retains final authority over institutional strategy, finances, and compliance, but must consider senate’s advice on academic implications.

Escalation:

• Academic risks of institutional significance are escalated from senate to council via formal reporting.

Key enablers of the ideal model

Governance is not just about structures, it’s about behaviours, relationships, and clarity. The following enablers help ensure that the tripartite model functions as intended:

• Terms of Reference must be clear and reflect Senate’s authority over academic matters, not just advisory input.
• Information flows must be structured, ensuring that Senate and Council both receive the data they need to perform their roles.
• Lines of accountability must be codified, with academic executives reporting to Senate on academic matters and to Council on broader institutional performance.
• Governance reviews must test all three entities, not just Council, for effectiveness and alignment.

Final thought

In a well-governed university, senate, council, and executive are not rivals, they are complementary pillars of a single system. When senate is reduced to ceremony, or council overreaches into academic affairs, or the executive becomes dominant across all domains, that balance is lost. And when governance becomes unbalanced, so too does trust, legitimacy, and ultimately, performance.

The challenge is not simply to preserve senate, but to reclaim its rightful role: as a structured, independent, and expert body that upholds the academic mission, and works in concert with council and the executive to steward the university through challenge and change.

Implementation of the tripartite model must be sensitive to institutional context. That said, exceptionalism, history and custom shouldn’t get in the way of good governance principles and practice.