Board of directors in the context of "UK labour law"

A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization.

CEOs find roles in various organizations, including public and private corporations, nonprofit organizations, and even some government organizations (notably state-owned enterprises). The governor and CEO of a corporation or company typically reports to the board of directors and is charged with maximizing the value of the business, which may include maximizing the profitability, market share, revenue, or another financial metric. In the nonprofit and government sector, CEOs typically aim at achieving outcomes related to the organization's mission, usually provided by legislation. CEOs are also frequently assigned the role of the main manager of the organization and the highest-ranking officer in the C-suite.

Corporate law (also known as company law or enterprise law) is the body of law governing the rights, relations, and conduct of persons, companies, organizations, and businesses. The term refers to the legal practice of law relating to corporations, or to the theory of corporations. Corporate law often describes the law relating to matters which derive directly from the life-cycle of a corporation. It thus encompasses the formation, funding, governance, and death of a corporation.

While the minute nature of corporate governance as personified by share ownership, capital market, and business culture rules differ, similar legal characteristics and legal problems exist across many jurisdictions. Corporate law regulates how corporations, investors, shareholders, directors, employees, creditors, and other stakeholders such as consumers, the community, and the environment interact with one another. Whereas the terms company law or business law may be colloquially used interchangeably with corporate law, the term business law in fact refers to wider concepts of commercial law, which is the law governing commercial and business-related activities. In some cases, this may include matters relating to corporate governance or financial law.

A corporate action is an event initiated by a public company that brings or could bring an actual change to the debt securities—equity or debt—issued by the company. Corporate actions are typically agreed upon by a company's board of directors and authorized by the shareholders. For some events, shareholders or bondholders are permitted to vote on the event. Examples of corporate actions include stock splits, dividends, mergers and acquisitions, rights issues, and spin-offs.

Some corporate actions such as a dividend (for equity securities) or coupon payment (for debt securities) may have a direct financial impact on the shareholders or bondholders; another example is a call (early redemption) of a debt security. Other corporate actions such as stock split may have an indirect financial impact, as the increased liquidity of shares may cause the price of the stock to decrease. Some corporate actions, such as name changes or ticker symbol changes to better reflect a company's business focus, have no direct financial impact on the shareholders; securities may be listed under a different security identifier (e.g. ISIN, CUSIP, Sedol) however. For example, "Apple Computers" changed its name to Apple Inc.

Economic democracy (sometimes called a democratic economy) is a socioeconomic philosophy that proposes to shift ownership and decision-making power from corporate shareholders and corporate managers (such as a board of directors) to a larger group of public stakeholders that includes workers, consumers, suppliers, communities and the broader public. No single definition or approach encompasses economic democracy, but most proponents claim that modern property relations externalize costs, subordinate the general well-being to private profit and deny the polity a democratic voice in economic policy decisions. In addition to these moral concerns, economic democracy makes practical claims, such as that it can compensate for capitalism's inherent effective demand gap.

Proponents of economic democracy generally argue that modern capitalism periodically results in economic crises, characterized by deficiency of effective demand; as society is unable to earn enough income to purchase its own production output. Corporate monopoly of common resources typically creates artificial scarcity, resulting in socio-economic imbalances that restrict workers from access to economic opportunity and diminish consumer purchasing power. Economic democracy has been proposed as a component of larger socioeconomic ideologies, as a stand-alone theory and as a variety of reform agendas. For example, as a means to securing full economic rights, it opens a path to full political rights, defined as including the former. Both market and non-market theories of economic democracy have been proposed. As a reform agenda, supporting theories and real-world examples can include decentralization, democratic cooperatives, public banking, fair trade and the regionalization of food production and currency.

A council is a group of people who come together to consult, deliberate, or make decisions. A council may function as a legislature, especially at a town, city or county/shire level, but most legislative bodies at the state/provincial or national level are not considered councils. At such levels, there may be no separate executive branch, and the council may effectively represent the entire government. A board of directors might also be denoted as a council.

A committee might also be denoted as a council, though a committee is generally a subordinate body composed of members of a larger body, while a council may not be. Because many schools have a student council, the council is the form of governance with which many people are likely to have their first experience as electors or participants.

The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the group or organisation, presides over meetings of the group, and is required to conduct the group's business in an orderly fashion.

In some organizations, the chair is also known as president (or other title). In others, where a board appoints a president (or other title), the two terms are used for distinct positions. The term chairman may be used in a neutral manner, not directly implying the gender of the holder. In meetings or conferences, to "chair" something (chairing) means to lead the event.

An artistic director is the executive of an arts organization, particularly in a theatre company or dance company, who handles the organization's artistic direction. They are generally a producer and director, but not in the sense of a mogul, since the organization is generally a non-profit organization. The artistic director of a theatre company is the individual with the overarching artistic control of the theatre's production choices, directorial choices, and overall artistic vision. In smaller theatres, the artistic director may be the founder of the theatre and the primary director of its plays. In larger non-profit theatres (often known in Canada and the United States as regional theatres), the artistic director may be appointed by the board of directors.

Worker representation on corporate boards of directors, also known as board-level employee representation (BLER), refers to the right of workers to vote for representatives on a board of directors in corporate law. In 2018, a majority of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and a majority of countries in the European Union, had some form of law guaranteeing the right of workers to vote for board representation. Together with a right to elect work councils, this is often called codetermination.

The first laws requiring worker voting rights include the Oxford University Act 1854 and the Port of London Act 1908 in the United Kingdom, the Act on Manufacturing Companies of 1919 in Massachusetts in the United States (although the act's provisions were completely voluntary), and the Supervisory Board Act 1922 (Aufsichtsratgesetz 1922) in Germany, which codified collective agreement from 1918 and expanded it in the 1976 Mitbestimmungsgesetz.