Govenda Reviews

Great Board Portal for Non-Profits!

Comments: This has been a great asset for our Board, as they are all busy business people in the community and we needed to be able to have everything in a more centralized location. Having it electronic, especially for voting and signatures, has helped us conduct business faster and with more communication.

Pros:

I love that this is available on all devices-web browser, tablets, ​and an app-so that Board members can log in from anywhere at any time. As an administrator, it was simple and easy to set up my Board and had all the features I needed. My Board members could easily navigate the portal right from the beginning and had no problems with getting the notifications. I had responses right away!

Cons:

It took a while to get everything going, as response time from the team was slow. But once I was set up, everything has been smooth.

Working well for a 12-member board

Pros:

Keeps everything in one place, securely. I particularly like that, e.g. access to committee meeting agendas or related documents are automatically restricted to committee members. BoardBookit has good functions for managing meeting agendas, and new ones like votes, polls, and tasks have been added since we started using the product.

Cons:

There are two functions I would like to see added or adjusted. One is that there is no way to post a link individually or in a group, e.g. to share relevant articles with board members, or to link to a shared Google doc or drive. Links must be added to a document and then posted. The second is that for ease of management, ability to write notes on, etc., all uploaded/posted documents including Excel files are converted to pdf format. But sometimes I want to securely share other types of files with the board, e.g. financials in a spreadsheet to be manipulated by other committee or board members.

Safety Director

Comments: Overall, I have to say I’m pretty happy with Govinda

Pros:

Simple to use an easy access for all other members of our board to get documents

Cons:

Sometimes things don’t process as fast as I would like it to

Govenda Review 2022

Comments: Great

Pros:

User friendly and effective. It is easy to add and delete documents. I like that users outside of the administrator isn't prompted by all notices when changes are made.

Cons:

My Board members have a problem suggesting amendments and making notes on documents. I suggest a box option to add comments to minutes and documents and a share options so it can be seen and or accessed by members

Feature-Rich, Best in Class

Comments: Excellent, absolutely excellent. The sales process was terrific, onboarding was phenomenal, ongoing training and support are top-notch, and feature development is continuous. The BoardBookit portal itself is exactly what our Board members and the Board liaison needed, easy to use and feature-rich. The price point is also excellent for our organization, with BoardBookit, onboarding, support, and training included in the annual subscription price. Excellent tool, excellent company.

Pros:

BoardBookit has top-notch, US-based support 24x7 for admin users and Board Member/end users. All support calls by our organization have been handled excellently. Training sessions are provided by BBi professionals directly to end users, anytime, anywhere. BoardBookit is a women-owned, women-led company whose sole focus is on meeting the needs of Board managers and Board members. The BBi end-user interface is accessible via computer, tablet, or mobile device; our Board members find it easy to access and intuitive to use. Our Board Liaison is able to set up, configure, and administrate BBi without assistance from internal IT support. This is an AMAZING testament to BBi's ease of use and excellent product design.

Cons:

BoardBookit is always adding and developing features and functionality, their product road map is full of great enhancements. The reporting and survey features are relatively new to BoardBookit, which we are happy to have available. Both surveys and reporting deserve more robust functionality, which I believe is already on the BBi road map.

Excellent value for the price

Comments: This has been an excellent way to streamline our governance operations and keep sensitive documents secure.

Pros:

This software does an excellent job at providing a high amount of functionality with an intuitive interface, on both the user-facing end and on the admin-facing end. This is very important because many of our users are late adopters to technology. The designers of the software clearly had a keen understanding of their audience and what their needs are. This software meets our basic needs and at a fair price.

Cons:

The software's functionality is, in many ways, "silo-ed." So, for instance, if you upload a document to one area of the board portal, you also have to upload it to every other place you'd like for it to appear. In other words, you can't effectively link to or refer to information stored on different parts of the portal. Also, we have two affiliate companies under an umbrella company -- there's no real way on the portal to delineate this on the portal; it is primarily set up for one sole organization.

Game Changer

Comments: We had looked at different options - password protected portal on website (too cumbersome to keep updated); Google docs (cumbersome, and not easy to manage); Boardable - cost/features were limited

Pros:

Given the remote nature of my board members, this tool has proved indispensable! They receive alerts, notices, access to all documents and meeting schedules from any device. Storage of historical documents has saved me so much time in not having to respond to one-off requests. Easy to use/learn.

Cons:

I would like to be able to have tracking in emails sent/opened; ability to edit offline votes; tasks are cumbersome to enter/manage; esignatures are very limiting -ie: I need one approval, and could be any one of three signers, but requiring all three to sign is cumbersome.

My worklife is soooo much easier!

Comments: The best experience -- right from the beginning -- is the support. If we can't figure it out on email, someone calls and we set up an appointment to get it right.
Everyone has been friendly from the very beginning.

Pros:

1) "Cloning" meetings and agendas 2) Emailing right from the site to our Board members 3) All of our Board members took to the site at the first meeting 4) Presentations are done right from Bookit now instead of working back and forth with Powerpoint and printed materials; we just project Bookit to the screen 5) No more dealing with Adobe; which is not always user friendly with Excel documents

Cons:

1) Agenda formatting; but we have a workaround; I wish there was a way to reduce/increase font size, margins, and the ability to put spacing inbetween agenda items.

Best Online Portal!

Comments: BoardBookit has given us the tools to distribute our board materials and documents; not only electronically but safely! The system has also allowed our managers to E sign materials before deadlines. It has truly been as great addition to our organization.

Pros:

Ease of Use Security PDF Sharing capabilities

Cons:

I don't really have any cons just a suggestion about the time entry on the agenda if it could update with the hour and minutes. For example if I place 10 minutes unto the time frame it would put 9:00am-9:10AM on the agenda. We manually type this out but other than that this system is great!

Great Platform

Comments: Govenda has been a terrific option for us to host Board meetings and obtain e-signatures on secure documents. The customer service team is super responsive (usually within an hour) and are quick at providing me answers or solutions to my questions.

Pros:

The product is super easy to use with very short implementation timeframe. I love that I'm able to control the company settings on my own (as a super user) rather than having to rely on the helpdesk to add, delete or change things. The drag, drop and copy features makes the software super easy to use and I can set up meetings & agendas quickly. My Board members have found the software extremely easy to use.

Cons:

Dashboard view only shows the next 3 meetings rather than ability to scroll to see all upcoming scheduled meetings with published agendas.

Makes Life Simpler

Comments: Amazing. Quick to respond to questions.

Pros:

Govenda makes organizing Board meetings easy and simple. The CS is outstanding!

Cons:

The need to post separate Pdfs. This makes it sometimes difficult when posting large documents

Highly Recommend Govenda for meeting management and document sharing

Comments: We have saved an extreme amount of time without having to prepare numerous copies of paper meeting agendas and attachments for distribution. Our meeting attendees and users love it because they don't have to pick up or print paper materials and they can access the materials from anywhere. The Govenda support team has always been attentive to requests for assistance and suggestions for product improvement.

Pros:

Integration and deployment was extremly easy. Navigation within the product is intuitive. This product saves so much time on preparing numerous copies of paper meeting materials and is easily accessible through the web or the app for all users. Such a time saver and very cost effective.

Cons:

The only issue I have had with using the product is moving agenda items with the drag and drop feature. It doesn't always "drop" the agenda item where I want it to be. I called support and they were able to immediately assist me with this issue by taking control and showing me another way to move my agenda line items. So while, this is what I like the least, it was still a positive experience with the support team.

A board meeting in the comfort of my chosen venue saves time, money & is safe

Comments: Fantastic andxrevolutionary

Pros:

It enables virtual meetings as demonstrated during disaster. Has redefined business continuity during disasters and pandemics

Cons:

Sometimes it fails to save annotations and they get lost without warning

HomeTown bank

Comments: Fun, Friendly, willing to try to understand the questions to find answers.

Pros:

Easy of use to add new/adjust and modify meetings. Offline usage. Ability to get items to users quickly.

Cons:

Logos and titles of Agendas should not be automated. We use Govenda for multiple meetings and we don't always want the banks logo and name published on them. Ability to attach multiple items on agenda or separate minutes. Wish you could adjust from the app. More training in the settings tab at set up. Ability to allow users to view the agenda prior to publishing that don't have admin rights.

A robust, yet simple to use board platform

Comments: I serve a 40-member board of trustees who are geographically diverse and have varying degrees of technical skills. Some are still using flip phones. I purposely selected this platform because it has the simplest user interface and is fairly easy to navigate even for the most dedicated Luddite. Prior to introducing Board BookIt, our board had no online platform and all communication was done via telephone or email. Board BookIt has streamlined a number of processes and has empowered our board to be more effective trustees.

Pros:

I like the ease of use. Once one agenda has been built in the system, there is the ability to import that agenda into a future meeting to utilize as a template. This is a great time-saver. I like the ability to import previous minutes into an agenda. I like that it tallies RSVPs and attendance for me. The survey, vote, and e-signature features have been a great asset for my 40-trustee, geographically-diverse board of trustees.

Cons:

The Minutes interface is problematic and difficult to navigate. There is embedded formatting that is terribly uncooperative. I have found it is easier to type my minutes into Word and then copy and paste into the minutes template.

BoardBookit Review

Comments: My overall experience with BoardBookit has been very good. All meeting information is housed in one location with easy access to current and previous meeting documents in a secure environment. Our meeting information can be accessed through apple or android devices at any time.

Pros:

What I like most about BoardBookit is how easy it was to get started and implement company wide. We use this software for all of our board and committee meetings. I like the fact that you can import previous agendas rather than starting each meeting from scratch. You can add documents when they become available as opposed to waiting until all documents are received to upload. If items need to be moved on the agenda, it's as easy as dragging and dropping where needed. BoardBookit is VERY user friendly. The customer support line is very helpful.

Cons:

I haven't found anything that I do not like about this software.

I'm New But Up-to-Speed!

Comments: BoardBookit keeps everyone connected, without a bunch of emails! Everyone knows to check their meeting for uploaded documents and doesn't have to worry about meetings they are not a part of. You can limit the number of Notifications and Reminders sent. You are able to forward load the system and only publish the upcoming months meetings; again, relieving the members of multiple notices for dates they may forget about. I am more hands on and "control" the program tighter than my predecessor.

Pros:

Learning curve is minimal for tech savvy and moderately savvy individuals.

Cons:

Not being able to make adjustments and continue in the same location/document. Edit the Agenda and it takes you out of the Meeting document.

Govenda- "Yay"

Pros:

The Govenda software is multifunctional and remotely accessible.

Cons:

Users have raised the below concerns: 1. Govenda does not allow annotations to minutes 2. Meeting reminders need to caption the name of the meeting instead of "Govenda Reminder"

Great Software

Pros:

How everything is managed in one software.

Cons:

I like everything about the software.

Easy for Users and Cost Effective

Comments: Solved our need to securely share documents with external users (board and committee members) and allow them to take their own notes on the files.

Pros:

Ease of use. Organization of meetings. Ease to rollout and excellent support (speak directly with help!)

Cons:

Should integrate with external meeting systems like Microsoft Teams. Calendar aspect needs improvement, since our members prefer outlook invitations.

Love it

Comments: My experience has been great. Again the ease of use if amazing and I really like all the organization features that it has to offer.

Pros:

The ease of use with this software is the best thing about it. I started this position almost 2 years ago and had never used anything like this or prepared board meetings. I was very easily self taught and that software is quite intuitive. If you think that is how it should work, that is how it works.

Cons:

My only con with this product is the dragging new agenda items into place. When you have really long agendas, this can be a quite cumbersome process. Not a big deal, but it would be really nice to select where you want a new item nestled under when creating that new agenda item versus it going to the bottom then having to drag it all that way back to the top or wherever it goes.

BoardBookit for Trustees

Comments: My overall experience has been great, the ease of using the system is awesome.

Pros:

I like most is the central location of everything. The opportunity to expand and use more of the features of BoardBookit would be ideal for a paperless environment, making it more efficient and clean. Grateful for the support we have received to date from our rep, she has truly answered all of our questions and took our feedback to review for our needs. Appreciate that!

Cons:

Awaiting the roll out of the "Survey" option. We do a lot of email polls and also require documents to be completed and signed by the trustees. The maximum currently on the vote option is 500 characters, while this seems like ample space it isn't for our needs. Some of the questionnaires we submit for completion have over 1,000 characters with multiple choice options. We are hoping with the Survey rollout, this would replace the "Vote" and "eSign" features with what we need.

Way Better Than Email

Comments: see above

Pros:

Organizing volunteers is hard enough, and is made especially difficult by the email overload that we all face in 2019. The best thing about BoardBookit is that is allows Administration to sequester communications with boards, the VIP volunteer corps, directly and confidentially into a discrete digital space. No more hunting around for "that email with that agenda that that admin sent last month," or "did we set a time or the next committee meeting/who is attending," nor disengagement on the call-in because documents can be found. BoardBookit organizes all of these functions an much more into one shared experience.

Cons:

For some reason, some emails generated in BoardBookit end up in some users' spam folders, which creates a necessity for alert/reminder redundancy that is annoying/inefficient. Probably just a user setting, and again these are volunteers who are already doing a lot and software ought to be seamless in order to keep them at their highest potential engagement.

Boardbookit is awesome

Comments: The benefits of using Boardbookit is that:
1. saving cost on lot of paper as we used to print our board papers
2. saves a lot of time
3. user friendly
4. Board Members are able to access the papers at anytime and anywhere preferable
5. uploading last minute papers isn't a problem now because before we would have to deliver papers to the board members residence around late at night
6. saving cost of tonners
7. makes the compiling and organising of Board Meetings and papers so much easier and efficient.

Pros:

I like that its so easy to use. its so user friendly and makes compiling of Board Papers so easy. I used to print all our board papers and had to manual number the pages and our Board Packages always consist of 350 pages and more and Board Bookie makes my work so much easier by generating the Agenda and numbering all the pages automatically. And the fact that the Board Papers are able to be accessed at any time and anywhere is really awesome:) It also automatically links the meeting date to outlook which sets as a reminder before the meeting which is really great. overall, I really love Boardbookit

Cons:

probably the fact that we have to upload everything in PDF form and I usually sometimes have to upload presentations and excels sheets but I would have to save it first in PDF form before uploading. apart from that I have no further comments

Product Review

Comments: I enjoy the ease of uploading documents. The simplicity of using it makes it so covenant. I do have to spend much time teaching new user

Pros:

It is very easy for my board . They haven't started using the voting part of the software yet, I hope to teach them this part next

Cons:

I am not sure I have found anything that I do not like.