Guide · Getting Started

Get your first board meeting done in BoardKite

From signing up to minutes in a few steps: create your account, tell BoardKite where your company is registered, then plan, send and hold your first board meeting. Each step of the setup links here with Read the guide.

Back to guide index Open meetings guides

1. Create your account and verify your email

Sign up and you are signed in straight away. BoardKite then asks you to verify your email: we send a link to the address you signed up with.

The link can be opened in any browser or on any device, not only the one you signed up on.
The setup page notices the verification by itself and moves on. If it has stopped checking automatically, choose Check again.
Wrong address? Choose Change email. No email yet? Choose Resend email.

Create your account Log in

2. Tell BoardKite where your company is registered

One screen asks for the country, the company form and, for companies in the United States, the state. BoardKite uses your answers to set up your workspace.

Time zone: your workspace starts in the time zone that fits your country.
Minutes: who signs the minutes and what they contain follow BoardKite's defaults for your company form. These are product defaults, not legal requirements or legal advice.
Billing currency: organizations registered in the EEA, the UK, Switzerland and most other European countries pay in euros; organizations registered elsewhere pay in US dollars. A subscription that has started keeps its currency.
If your company form is not in the list, choose Other and type it in. You can change all of this later in Settings.

3. Plan your first board meeting

Your dashboard starts with a Plan your first board meeting card. Choose it to open the create dialog, then work through the steps in the table.

In the create dialog, set the meeting type to Board. The date starts two weeks from today so there is time to prepare; change it if you need to.
Start from a template to get a ready agenda. Its items are owned by you as the organizer, and you can reassign them to presenters as you go.
The card on your dashboard shows where you are and lets you continue where you left off.

Meeting steps
Step	What you do	What attendees get
Create	Choose the Board type, set the date and start from a template.	Nothing yet.
Agenda	Review the template's items and adjust them.	Nothing yet.
Attendees	Finalize who attends and in which role. You can also send a Save the Date to hold the date while the agenda is still being finalized.	Nothing yet, unless you send a Save the Date to hold the date.
Send	Send the final invitations.	An email with a link to the meeting, where they reply: accepted, tentative or declined.
Hold	Run the meeting from the agenda on the day.	The agenda during the meeting.
Minutes	Write the minutes from the meeting and send them for approval and signing.	The signers you choose sign them. Board members with a seat can read the signed minutes.

Meetings overview Agenda workflow Invites & roles guide

4. Who's on the board?

When you add people to a board meeting, BoardKite asks who is on the board. Everyone you add is, or is invited to become, a member of your organization. For each person, an owner chooses a board seat or Not on the board.

Seats: Chair, Board member, Deputy or Observer. Only owners choose board seats. Job titles grant nothing by themselves.
People who aren't members yet get an invitation to join your organization. A seat you choose for them is reserved and becomes active when they join. Until then they get meeting emails only: no board-only items, no vote, and they don't count as a director.
On the Attendees list, someone who hasn't joined shows Hasn't joined yet, or Invite expired when the invitation has run out. Owners and admins can choose Resend on any pending invitation; the meeting's organizers can resend plain member invitations for that meeting. Organizers who aren't owners can add people but not choose seats. Settings → Board lists the reserved seats.
Two to three days before the meeting, people who still haven't joined can get one reminder email with a fresh link to join. They are not sent a second one.
The meeting's Secretary and Minutes Adjuster are meeting roles, not seats. While they hold the role they also see that meeting's board-only items, so they can write and adjust the minutes.
Auditors usually hold an Observer seat: they see the whole agenda, including board-only items, but can't vote. When a person's job title is Auditor, the step suggests Make Observer.

What each person can do
Person	Board-only items	Other agenda items	Votes and counts as a director	Becomes active
Chair, Board member	All	All	Yes	When they join
Deputy	All	All	Only when the chair marks them acting for the meeting	When they join
Observer, for example the auditor	All	All	No	When they join
CEO without a seat	No	All	No	When they join
Anyone else without a seat	No	Only the items they own	No	When they join
Invited but hasn't joined yet	No	No	No	—

Invites & roles guide

5. Optional: import historical signed minutes

If you have signed minutes from before BoardKite, import them so your records are searchable in one place.

Historical import guide