(WICB)St John's, Antigua -The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) has moved to overhaul its committee system to ensure greater efficiency and make greater use of specialised skills from outside the Board.
In announcing this, President of the WICB, Teddy Griffith, said this restructuring affected not only the composition of the committees but also their functions and reporting lines.
Griffith, delivering the feature address at a dinner held at the Trinidad Hilton Hotel and Conference Centre on Friday night, marking the 48th Anniversary of the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board, said in the new arrangement there would be six main committees - Executive, Development, Finance and Audit, Marketing and Business Development, Human Resources Development and Code of Conduct and Disciplinary.
The new Development Committee has been vested with wide-ranging responsibilities and would be the nerve centre of cricket administration at the level of the WICB, the President said.
"In essence it is responsible for determining, implementing and reporting on the Board's Cricket Development Programme," he added.
This committee's work would focus on the infrastructure to support the development of the region's most talented young cricketers to prepare them for first-class and Test cricket, Griffith said. It would oversee directly the implementation of Coaching and Player Development programmes and assist the member boards in achieving their development aims and objectives, he stated.
"Further this Committee will have responsibility for two of the most important tasks being undertaken by the WICB. The ICC has mandated that Women's Cricket be integrated into the overall structure of cricket in all its members by March 2005. This committee will be managing the integration of the West Indies Women's Cricket Federation (WIWCF) into the WICB and supporting the development of women's cricket in the West Indies,"
The WICB President revealed.
"Secondly as the only Board with full membership of the ICC in the hemisphere, the WICB has a responsibility to assist in the development of cricket in the Americas Region. The Development Committee therefore has among its principal objectives, the furthering of the WICB's interest in the development of the Americas Region and working together with the ICC Development Unit and the ICC Affiliates and Associates in the Americas to build the sport, on and off the field, in the Americas," the president told his audience.
A re-constituted Cricket Committee - Playing- (CCP) would be responsible for matters related to the playing of the game in the West Indies and would report directly to the Development Committee, he said. Each Territorial Board would nominate one person to sit on the CCP and that nominee must have represented the West Indies or his country or have been a regional or international umpire, he stated. The WIWCF, the West Indies Players' Association (WIPA) and the West Indies Cricket Umpires' Association (WICUA) would each have one member on the CCP and the Chairman of the Senior and Junior Selection Committees would also sit on the CCP, he added.
The WICB president said a Finance & Audit Committee would review the company's financial reporting process, system of internal controls and management of financial risks, the audit process and the WICB's process for monitoring compliance with laws and regulations. This committee would include two independent financial/accounting experts not associated with the WICB, he pointed out.
The Human Resources Development (HRD) Committee would also contain two independent experts in human resources management and industrial relations, Griffith said. This Committee would review and advise the Board on the company's HRD practices and procedures with emphasis on ensuring an appropriate organization structure and that procedures are in place for evaluating the organisation's effectiveness in achieving its objectives, he said.
The Board also agreed to a Code of Conduct and Disciplinary Committee that is totally independent of Board membership, Griffith said. Its five members would comprise of three persons drawn from the Judiciary in the West Indies - one of whom would be chairman -and two former West Indies cricketers of high repute who had no affiliation to the Board, he said.
This Committee would monitor and implement the Board's Code of Ethics and Business Conduct and also would serve as the Disciplinary Committee for players, officials, referees and umpires.
"Member boards have been invited to submit nominations for the non-WICB members of all committees and we expect soon to be in a position to announce the full complement of the committees," he said.
"We at the Board believe that this structure will give us the best of both worlds with the expertise from among the directors supplemented and complemented by expertise from outside the Board who will be able to bring an independent eye to the operations as well as to offer informed advice," the president said.
Further, he said, the streamlining should allow for a greater sharing of information across the disciplines and faster decision-making. These two factors must lead to greater efficiency in managing West Indies Cricket, he said.
In making a plea for the member boards to become more involved, the WICB president said the active support of members was crucial to the success of the plans. He pointed out that at nearly every stage, there was an important role for the member boards.
"The WICB is not a separate entity imposing its will by divine right. It is made up of constituent parts and unless those constituent parts accept their responsibilities to the whole then as the writer says, "things fall apart," he concluded.