Megan Barnes, Head of Company Secretariat, National Grid PLC, is being recognized by Diligent's Modern Governance 100 program. The Modern Governance 100 is a community of governance professionals who have been nominated for their innovation, resilience, dedication and empathy in the face of a complex and ever-changing world.
The past few months have been difficult for many, but for Barnes, who took over as Head of Secretariat in January 2020, the challenges brought on by the pandemic were manifold: being an efficient leader in the face of adversity, navigating the complexities caused by COVID, helping global teams adapt to new work conditions and ensuring National Grid PLC's stringent compliance standards were adhered to.
Determined not to let these obstacles undermine National Grid's compliance processes and to ensure the Company Secretariat team continued to function efficiently, Barnes pioneered critical digital transformation initiatives that not only enhanced governance practices but also facilitated better information dissemination for the boards and improved decision-making.
''Megan has been key in supporting and engaging the Board during the pandemic to make sure the leadership can operate 'BAU' [business as usual] during challenging times across a range of time zones,'' said nominator Nick Ivory, Company Secretarial Assistant, National Grid PLC.
How Barnes Uses Diligent
- Strategic entity management: To centralize National Grid PLC's corporate data across entities to ensure compliance, mitigate risks and improve governance.
- Board and committee effectiveness: To enable quicker preparation and secure collaboration among board members.
- Workflow optimization and efficiency: To shorten approval cycles, improve workflows and transparency, and achieve greater regulatory compliance and efficiency across the organization.
About the Nominee
Barnes began her career in Company Secretaryship a decade ago, and has worked with industry leaders including Rolls-Royce PLC. At National Grid PLC, she worked across different roles in the Company Secretary team and became the Head of Company Secretariat in January 2020.About National Grid PLC
National Grid PLC is one of the world's largest investor-owned energy companies, committed to delivering electricity and gas safely, reliably and efficiently to millions of customers and communities across the US and UK. They are also driving change through engineering innovation and by incubating new ideas with the power to revolutionize the industry. National Grid continues to embrace cleaner energy and is focused on finding ways to decarbonize the energy system; from building interconnectors to allow the UK to share clean energy with Europe, to investing in renewable energy generation in the US.![](https://annyazommq.cloudimg.io/https://dg-staging-450520-cd.azurewebsites.net/-/media/project/diligent/master/au-whitepaper-images/whitepaper-images/a-buyers-guide-to-esg-data-management-software.png?h=511&iar=0&w=765&rev=263be577-e761-4e63-96ef-8ab461f2c7d1&org_if_sml=1&force_format=webp&hash=66FFC6017BFA4AEF4FEB228C028B7AA2)
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