Independent performance evaluations for CAOs, executive directors, and presidents.
Built on evidence. Run by a neutral third party. Useful to the board and the leader both.
Why boards bring in an independent evaluator.
Bring in an independent evaluator and everyone leaves the room with the same picture: the board, the chair, and the leader all see where things stand and where they're going. That happens because the evidence is broader than any one director's read, the process is neutral, and nobody is grading their own boss.
Council members, board members, and commissioners are smart and well-intentioned. Evaluating a full-time senior executive is a specialized skill, and a part-time elected or volunteer body has a different role to play.
A structured senior-leader evaluation needs three things at once: an evidence base broader than any one director's experience of the leader; a process that protects confidentiality on both sides; and time — run over weeks, not packed into a single closed session.
An independent third party delivers all three. The board still owns the decision. The chair stays in the role of chair. The leader being evaluated gets a process they can trust. Everyone — board, chair, leader — walks out of the room with the same clear picture of where things stand and where they're going.
What a BlueChip governance evaluation looks like.
The output is an evaluation the board, the leader, and the public can all stand behind, plus a forward plan both sides trust. Here is the process that produces it.
Six stages. Roughly ten to twelve weeks from kickoff to board presentation.
Scoping
A working session with the council or board chair to align on the questions the evaluation needs to answer, the stakeholder list, the timeline, and how the engagement will be communicated internally.
Stakeholder interviews
Confidential, structured interviews with council or board members, direct reports, and key external stakeholders. A mix of in-person and video, scheduled around the realities of part-time elected and volunteer roles. Eight to twenty interviews, depending on the size of the organization.
Leadership assessment
A validated leadership assessment of the leader being evaluated, paired with a structured self-reflection. This adds a data layer that interviews alone cannot.
Report drafting and no-surprises review
Findings get synthesized into a written report. The leader being evaluated reads the draft before the board sees it. Errors get corrected. Misreadings get clarified.
Board or council presentation
The findings, presented in a closed session. Q&A. A facilitated conversation about what changes — for the leader, for the board, and for the working relationship between them.
Forward-looking performance plan
A written development plan with concrete commitments, owned by the leader and endorsed by the board. Six-month cycle, with an optional half-year check-in to make sure the plan is being executed.
What you walk away with.
- A written report — themes, evidence, leadership strengths, development priorities, and observations on the governance-leader relationship.
- A validated leadership assessment with a private debrief.
- A board or council presentation that doesn't read like a slide deck.
- A forward-looking performance plan, written down, with concrete commitments.
- An optional half-year check-in to verify the plan is being executed.
How the leader being evaluated is treated.
A senior-leader evaluation that lands well treats the leader being evaluated as a full participant in the process, not a subject of it.
The leader being evaluated:
- Is briefed on the process and the kinds of stakeholders being interviewed — board members, direct reports, key external partners — before interviews begin.
- Completes the leadership assessment and self-reflection alongside the stakeholder interviews — not as an afterthought.
- Reads the draft report before the board sees it, with a private debrief to flag factual errors and clarify any misreadings.
- Is in the room for the board presentation, not waiting outside it.
- Gets a personal copy of the final report, the assessment results, and the performance plan.
Confidentiality runs in both directions. Stakeholder interviews are non-attributed — themes go into the report, names don't. The leader's responses during their debrief stay between BlueChip and the leader unless the leader chooses to share them.
The final report is treated as confidential personnel information. It goes to the council or board chair and the leader being evaluated, and is reviewed by the full council or board in closed session. It is not posted publicly or shared outside that room. Where Alberta's Access to Information Act and Protection of Privacy Act (formerly FOIP) apply, the report sits under the same personnel and personal-information exemptions that protect any other senior-leader performance record.
A good evaluation isn't done to a leader. It's done with them.
Why BlueChip.
Senior-leader evaluations sit at the intersection of performance review, political navigation, and risk management. BlueChip brings all three to the table.
An undergraduate degree in education and a Master's in coaching, for the development conversation and the plan that follows it. Senior HR background — training and development, recruitment, investigations — for the risk and governance work. Public sector administration experience, for understanding the kinds of organizations BlueChip evaluates from the inside. Twenty-five years in high-stakes competitive environments, for reading people who are guarded, defensive, or actively managing the narrative — which most senior leaders being evaluated are, at least at first.
That last piece matters more than it sounds. Reading a guarded room is a learned skill. Twenty-five years of decision-making under pressure — with money and ego on the line — is how BlueChip learned it.
What it costs and how long.
What you get for it: an evaluation the board, the leader, and the public can all stand behind, and a forward plan both sides trust. Set that against the cost of a senior-leader relationship that drifts for a year without a clear read, or a contentious evaluation that ends up in the news. The evaluation is the cheaper line item.
Pricing is scoped to the organization and shared on the Clarity Call, where we give you a clear number so you can budget. What you pay scales with complexity: post-secondary boards, multi-site operations, and unusual governance structures sit at the higher end.
Approximately 10–12 weeks from kickoff to board presentation. The optional half-year check-in extends the engagement to roughly six months. Best practice is an annual full evaluation, with the check-in landing at the midpoint.
The fee includes everything: stakeholder interviews, leadership assessment and debrief, written report, board or council presentation, and the forward-looking performance plan.
BlueChip is based in Edmonton. Travel is broken out as a separate line item in every proposal.
Engagements typically start with a $99 Clarity Call. The fee is credited back against your first invoice if the call leads to working together — so there's no premium for the first conversation. Done a free diagnostic first? The $99 is on us, and the call is free.
Not sure where to start?
If your council or board is approaching evaluation season — or if you'd like external rigor on this year's round — start with a Clarity Call. Thirty minutes. We talk about what your organization needs, what a BlueChip engagement would look like for you, and whether we're the right fit.
For some organizations, a governance evaluation is the right starting point. For others, a Leadership Academy makes more sense — particularly when the gap is leadership development across a team, not the performance of a single senior leader. We'll talk through both on the call.
Or, for a free starter: take the Org Pulse — a 5-minute organizational health audit. Bring the result into the call and the $99 is waived.
Where to go from here.
Book a Clarity Call
You know the situation. You want a working conversation with someone who'll tell you the truth and map next steps. Fee credited against the first invoice if you engage. Done a free diagnostic first? The $99 is on us. The call is free.
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Not sure if this is the right conversation yet. Send a note — a few sentences is enough. We'll tell you straight whether BlueChip fits, or point you somewhere better.
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