Technology Can I Use Our Cat Herder for Staff Meetings?

Our Cat Herder is built for board meetings, but plenty of our clients also use it for staff meetings, management team meetings, and subcommittees. The agenda builder, minute taking, action tracking, and document distribution all work the same way regardless of the meeting type.

So yes, you can use it for staff meetings. The real question is how to set it up.

There are two approaches, and the right one depends on who is involved and how much separation you need between board and staff data. Our help documentation on subcommittees and additional meeting groups covers the technical setup in detail.

Option 1: Add Staff Meetings to Your Existing Portal

This is what most of our clients start with. You create a new meeting type for your staff meetings, the same way you might already have separate meeting types for board meetings, AGMs, and committee meetings, then invite the relevant people.

How It Works

• Create a new meeting type (e.g. “Staff Meeting” or “Management Team”) in your portal settings.
• Build an agenda template for that meeting type so standing items are pre-populated each time.
• Set discussion groups to private so board discussions stay visible only to board members, and staff discussions stay with staff.
• Manage document folder access so staff members only see the folders relevant to them. New members have no folder access until an administrator explicitly grants it. See the portal configuration guide for step-by-step setup.
• Add staff members to the portal with the appropriate role. Any member can create meetings, so you can delegate meeting management without granting full admin access.

When This Works Well

• The same person (often a company secretary or office manager) administers both board and staff meetings.
• Staff members are comfortable being in the same portal as the board, even though they cannot see board-specific data.
• You want one place for all your organisation’s meeting records, actions, and documents.

Risks to Consider

Running board and staff meetings in the same portal requires careful permission management. If you get it wrong, staff members could end up seeing board-sensitive materials, or board members could accidentally share confidential HR or operational documents with the wrong group.

• Root-level documents are visible to everyone. Any file stored at the top level of your Documents section can be seen by every portal member, including staff. If board-sensitive documents (financials, legal advice, CEO performance reviews) end up there instead of a restricted folder, staff will have access. You need to be disciplined about folder structure from day one.
• Any portal member can create a meeting of any type. This is by design for operational flexibility, but it means a staff member could create a board meeting or view meeting types they should not be involved in. There is no way to restrict which meeting types a member can create.
• Admin access is portal-wide. If a staff member needs admin privileges to manage their own meetings, they will have admin access across the entire portal, including board meetings, board documents, and board member details. This is the main reason organisations choose a second portal instead.
• Permission management is ongoing. Every time you add a new staff member, you need to check their folder access, discussion group membership, and role permissions. In a busy organisation, it is easy for someone to be granted access they should not have, especially during handovers or role changes.
• You cannot undo accidental exposure. If a staff member briefly sees a board document they should not have accessed, you cannot take that back. For organisations dealing with sensitive governance matters (disciplinary proceedings, executive remuneration, legal disputes), this risk alone may justify a separate portal.

If any of these risks are a concern for your organisation, Option 2 is the safer choice.

Option 2: Create a Separate Portal for Staff Meetings

If you need a clear boundary between board and staff data, a second portal gives you complete separation. Board members cannot see the staff portal (unless they are explicitly added to it), and staff cannot see the board portal.

How It Works

• Create a new portal through your Our Cat Herder account. You will start with a fresh 45-day trial.
• Set it up independently with its own meeting types, agenda templates, discussion groups, and document folders.
• Invite staff members to the new portal. People who need access to both portals (e.g. the CEO or company secretary) can switch between them from a single login using the portal switcher. The portal name is displayed clearly so you always know which portal you are working in. You can also brand each portal with different colours to make it immediately obvious which one you are in.
• Assign different roles per portal. The same person can be an administrator in the staff portal and a regular member in the board portal, or vice versa. Roles are independent across portals, so you have full control over who can do what in each one.

When This Makes Sense

• A staff member administers the staff meetings but should have no access to board materials.
• You want zero risk of accidental data crossover between board governance and day-to-day operations.
• Different departments or teams need their own meeting spaces with separate admin control.
• You are a secretariat managing multiple organisations and want each client’s meetings in their own portal. See our guide on when to create a new portal for more detail.

Cost

A second portal follows the same pricing as your first — from $595 per year for organisations under $1 million in annual revenue. We offer multi-portal discounts for portals paid for by the same organisation, so contact us at support@ourcatherder.com or call +61 3 5429 3786 to discuss.

Which Option Should I Choose?

For many organisations, starting with a single portal is the simplest option. It keeps everything in one place, costs nothing extra, and the permission controls are enough to keep board and staff data separate.

A second portal makes more sense when the person running staff meetings should not have any visibility into board materials.

Either way, your staff meetings get the same agenda builder, board pack distribution, minute taking, action tracking, discussions, document storage, and voting that your board uses.

Beyond Staff Meetings

The same setup works for any meeting type your organisation runs: subcommittee meetings (finance, risk, governance, nominations), working groups, advisory committees, and AGMs. If your board already uses Our Cat Herder, adding these other meetings means everyone works from one system instead of passing documents around by email.

Start a free 45-day trial or get in touch if you have questions about setting up your portal for staff meetings.