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[Jimmy-T]

There’s a truism in strata that the people you want on your committee – smart, informed and energetic – are often too busy making money to pay their mortgages (and levies) to devote too much time to the building in which they live. Serving on a committee can be time consuming and a drain on energy, especially …
https://www.flatchat.com.au/committee-pay/

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A similarly interesting question is “Do Strata Committee members want to be paid”.

I suspect that in most cases the answer is “No, I’m not doing it for the money but I am not happy with the number of unpaid hours I have to put in”.
And this is usually for one of two reasons – the Committee just has too much work to do or other members of the Strata Committee aren’t pulling their weight and sharing the workload.
Trying to change the work habits of fellow Strata Committee members is hard to imagine !
Trying to reduce the workload on volunteer Strata Committee members is the more practical approach.

How does a Strata Committee set a workload appropriate to half a dozen unpaid volunteers, who might talk on a Whatsapp group once a week and have meetings every month or two?

They need someone to point them towards what decisions they need to focus on and someone to pick up on what gets missed and someone to make sure decisions translate into action. This is especially so for buildings dealing with major issues such as defects or buildings keen to take a proactive stance on energy efficiency. But in every case the need is for the Committee members to be able to make timely well informed decisions without spending hours on detail.

They can only do this with help.
In a larger building a good building manager will ensure that he obtains the necessary decisions from the Strata Committee and then implements them.
In buildings without this calibre of building management the Owners Corporation needs to engage a ”Business Manager” to research issues, put relevant points to Strata Committee members for their focus, obtain their decision and ensure follow through action.

Is your Strata Manager the person to do this ?
Strata Committee members have to decide, but in many cases it is likely that the strata manager’s skillset is elsewhere.

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