Governance Adviser, Beyond Governance
You can meet the academic requirements for CGIUKI Graduate membership through the Chartered Governance Qualifying Programme or a validated postgraduate degree. Completing either route leads to GradCG. Chartered status is a further membership step that requires relevant work experience and a successful application.
This guide explains the UK and Ireland division’s qualification routes, how to choose a starting point, and the difference between completing your studies and becoming chartered.
CGI is the Chartered Governance Institute; CGIUKI is its UK and Ireland division. The Institute offers several qualifications, so “CGI qualified” needs context. In a discussion about becoming chartered, it usually refers to completing the academic requirements for Graduate membership or holding a higher membership grade.
Graduate membership allows you to use GradCG after your name. It does not, by itself, make you a Chartered Governance Professional or Chartered Secretary. Those designations belong to Associate and Fellow members. See CGIUKI’s Graduate membership guidance.
What to compare | Qualifying Programme | Validated postgraduate degree |
Study structure | Professional modules assessed by examination. | A university programme mapped to the Institute’s core qualification content. |
Qualification outcome | Graduate membership of CGIUKI after successful completion. | The university award and the route to Graduate membership, subject to the programme and Institute requirements. |
Planning your studies | Plan modules and tuition around your exam sittings. | Check the university’s timetable, assessment methods and available study modes. |
First step | Establish your entry point and any exemptions with CGIUKI. | Check the exact course’s validation and admission requirements, then apply to the university. |
Start with the outcome you want. If your priority is the professional qualification, compare the modules you would actually need to complete. If a university degree is also important to you, compare validated postgraduate courses. Then test each option against your working week, budget and preferred assessment style.
The full programme comprises seven modules across two parts. Exemptions can reduce the number you need to complete.
Part One at Level 6 | Part Two at Level 7 |
Company Law | Development of Strategy |
Level 6 corresponds to final-year undergraduate study; Level 7 corresponds to postgraduate study. These are academic levels, not separate university degree awards. Consult the current programme and syllabus when planning your modules.
CGIUKI’s detailed entry guidance says no pre-study is required for direct enrolment, while recommending related study at Level 4 or above, or substantial relevant experience. You do not necessarily need a degree or the Foundation Programme to start.
Before booking tuition, ask CGIUKI to confirm your entry point and exemptions. Send evidence of your qualifications, professional memberships and experience; a course title or job title alone may not establish eligibility.
Related degrees and professional qualifications
Law and finance graduates may qualify for relevant module exemptions. There are also professional entry arrangements for eligible lawyers and accountants, and recognition arrangements for members of ICSI and ICSAN. Check the conditions that apply to your own qualification and membership rather than assuming every applicant follows the same route.
Fast Track entry
Experienced professionals may qualify for a shorter programme. Eligibility depends on qualifications, professional standing and relevant experience; the applicable modules must be confirmed. Use CGIUKI’s Fast Track eligibility guidance before estimating your completion date or budget.
When Foundation may help
The Foundation Programme is an open-entry Level 4 qualification covering business, law, company compliance and administration, and finance. CGIUKI gives a typical duration of eight to nine months. It prepares students for Part One and can be a useful starting point if those subjects are unfamiliar.
Being eligible to start Part One and feeling prepared for it are different questions. Look at the syllabus and sample assessment material before deciding whether Foundation would help you build the knowledge you need. Explore Foundation tuition at Campbell’s.
A validated postgraduate course provides a university-based route to the same Graduate membership outcome. Check the current CGIUKI partner-course list for the exact programme you are considering; a degree with “governance” in its title is not enough to establish that it qualifies.
Compare the university’s entry requirements, assessment methods, attendance commitments and total fees. Apply directly to the university and register with CGIUKI during your first term or semester, as the Institute requires. Ask the programme team to explain both the university award and the membership outcome before enrolling.
CGIUKI’s Qualifying Programme overview gives a typical duration of two to five years. Your route, exemptions, study pace and assessment results affect the actual time. Eligible Fast Track students may finish sooner.
Examinations run in June and November. CGIUKI recommends taking no more than two exams per session. Plan your sittings around the modules you need and the study time you can sustain.
For a postgraduate course, use the university’s stated duration for your chosen full-time or part-time programme. Time to complete the qualification and time to achieve chartered membership are separate calculations.
The Qualifying Programme can be studied alongside work. CGIUKI advises allowing up to 200 study hours per module. For illustration, spreading 200 hours across 25 weeks means eight hours a week for one module. This is a planning calculation, not a guaranteed workload.
Put that allowance against your real calendar before choosing an exam sitting. Include busy periods at work, holidays and other commitments. Ask a prospective tutor how much time to reserve for assignments, revision and practice papers.
Check CGIUKI’s current fees alongside the tuition provider’s price. Your budget may include registration, student membership, examination entry, exemption fees, study materials and tuition. Resits or postponements can add costs. Some routes package several charges together, so check what is included before adding individual fees.
For a university course, ask what the university fee covers and whether any Institute charges are additional. Compare the full cost of your intended route rather than a single module price. View Campbell’s courses and tuition fees.
Academic completion and professional recognition are distinct. CGIUKI’s chartered membership guidance explains the experience requirements and the designations available to each grade.
Grade | What it signifies |
GradCG | Completion of the Institute’s academic qualification requirements. Graduate membership alone does not confer chartered status. |
ACG | Chartered membership. Normally six years of relevant experience, reducible to three with a relevant degree or professional qualification, alongside the academic requirement. |
FCG | Chartered membership recognising more extensive professional experience. Normally eight years, reducible to five with a relevant degree or professional qualification, subject to the Fellowship requirements. |
Relevant experience gained before or during study can count. Once eligible, you apply for chartered membership; it is not an automatic upgrade after a set number of years. Associates and Fellows may use the designations Chartered Governance Professional and Chartered Secretary.
The Advanced Certificate in Corporate Governance is a standalone Level 6 qualification for developing governance expertise. It does not, on its own, complete the route to chartered membership. CGIUKI currently lists eligibility for Affiliated membership and a Qualifying Programme module bypass among its benefits.
Consider it if you want a focused qualification before committing to the full programme. If chartered status is your eventual goal, establish exactly how it would count towards your remaining study requirements. Explore Campbell’s Advanced Certificate tuition.
Do I need a degree to start
No. CGIUKI permits direct entry without prior study, while recommending suitable preparation or experience. Foundation is an open-entry preparation option. Confirm your starting point with the Institute before enrolling.
Does a governance masters degree automatically lead to GradCG
No. The course must be an appropriate CGIUKI-validated programme and you must meet the relevant completion and Institute registration requirements. Check the exact course, rather than relying on its title.
Does completing the qualification make me chartered
Completion leads to Graduate membership. Chartered status requires the relevant experience and a successful application for Associate or Fellow membership. Experience gained while studying can count.
Is tuition compulsory
The Qualifying Programme offers self-study and tuition options. Choose support according to how you learn and the feedback you need. Ask what a tuition package includes, how tutor access works and which costs remain payable to CGIUKI.
Before you enrol, establish three things: the membership outcome you want, the entry point and exemptions available to you, and a study commitment you can sustain. That gives you a practical basis for comparing courses.
Campbell’s College is a CGIUKI Recommended Tuition Partner, founded in 1991. Its distance-learning support includes recorded lectures, course notes, marked assignments and access to tutors with practical governance experience.
Browse Campbell’s courses and tuition fees to explore support for the Foundation Programme, Qualifying Programme modules and Advanced Certificate.
Join students worldwide studying CGIUKI
qualifications with Campbell’s College.
Evon Chung is a Chartered Governance Fellow who has spent more than a decade bringing order to some of the most complex corporate structures in the world. As Manager of Global Corporate Services at Deel, she oversees the governance of around 350 entities across 125 jurisdictions, leading an international team of sixteen lawyers and governance professionals. Before Deel she held senior corporate secretarial roles at The Law Debenture Group and Eversheds Sutherland, running multi jurisdictional projects for FTSE 250 and Fortune 500 clients.
She has also sat on the other side of the exam paper. Some years ago, as a Subject Matter Expert for the Institute, she set and reviewed questions for the foundation level examination. She no longer does so, and her work with Campbell’s is purely as a tutor. The insight stays with her, and few tutors understand better what an examiner is looking for.
Evon came to governance by accident. An engineer by training, she joined a charity board of seventeen trustees, none of whom had a governance background, to help write the minutes. A few years later a law firm invited her into corporate secretarial work, and she never looked back. In a previous life she was a volunteer emergency ambulance technician, which taught her to stay calm under pressure, decide quickly on incomplete information, and know when to lead and when to hand over.
She teaches strategy as a form of storytelling. Her students arrive knowing the words and leave able to use them.
“Strategy is not about execution. It is about direction, intent, and asking the bigger questions.”
Steven Jones has spent his career making governance work where it matters most. As Deputy Director for Governance & Accountability at the Department of Health and Social Care, he leads the teams responsible for the governance of one of the UK’s largest government departments, supporting Ministers, the Departmental Board and senior leaders through periods of significant organisational change. His work spans corporate governance, board effectiveness, risk, accountability, public appointments and legal compliance, with responsibility for governance frameworks affecting millions of people.
Before joining DHSC, Steven led governance across some of government’s most complex programmes, including the UK’s border response during COVID-19, Brexit preparations at the Cabinet Office, and corporate governance for HM Revenue & Customs’ largest business group. Alongside his public service career, he founded Disability Connect Mentoring Scheme, advising organisations on disability inclusion and accessible leadership, and serves on Transport for London’s Independent Disability Advisory Group.
Steven teaches Company Law from the perspective of someone who uses it every day rather than someone who simply studies it. He believes the biggest misconception is that company law is about compliance alone. The rules matter, but the real question is why they exist, who they protect and what happens when the law reaches its limits. That is where judgement begins, and where governance professionals earn their value.
He describes governance simply: it is about who has power, how they are held to account, and what happens when they are not. Once students understand that, the legislation stops feeling like a collection of disconnected rules and starts making sense as part of a much bigger picture. His aim is for every student to leave not just knowing directors’ duties, but being able to explain them, apply them and use them confidently in practice.
Away from governance, Steven is a mentor, disability advocate and podcast host. He is also, somewhat unexpectedly, a partly qualified counsellor and the owner of a tortoise called Frank.
“People often think governance is just about board meetings. It is not. It is about who has power in an organisation, how they are held to account for using it, and what happens when they do not.”
Jamie Hunt is a barrister and a Fellow of the Chartered Governance Institute who has spent his career at the demanding edge of regulation, governance and risk. He is Director of Governance and Legal at the Royal Institute of British Architects, where he leads governance, legal, risk, data protection and procurement, advises the board, and serves as the organisation’s Designated Safeguarding Lead. He also advises Social Work England on complex fitness to practise matters. Before RIBA he was General Counsel at the Security Industry Authority and Head of Legal at the ACCA.
He earned his Chartered qualification through the Fast Track route and passed with distinction. He brings deep experience of risk to the module he teaches, having advised audit and risk committees and senior risk officers on operational, reputational and strategic risk across regulated organisations.
Jamie is also a natural teacher and examiner. He trains advocates for the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, lectures in advocacy at the University of Westminster, and serves as Lead Examiner for the Bar Standards Board professional ethics examination. He previously lectured in Corporate Governance and Boardroom Dynamics at Campbell’s College. Students gain an instructor who understands risk as a practitioner and knows exactly how to prepare a candidate for assessment.
John McLean is a chartered company secretary and a Fellow of the Chartered Governance Institute, currently Head of Governance and Company Secretary at Great Places Housing Group. He has built his career in complex regulated settings, advising chairs, boards and executives across corporate governance, risk, data protection, safeguarding and quality. Before housing he managed national programmes at NICE and led performance and compliance roles across local government.
He earned his Chartered qualification the recent and the hard way, completing the programme between 2023 and 2025 with distinctions in both Company Compliance and Administration and Boardroom Dynamics. He now tutors both at Campbell’s College.
John is a law graduate who fell for governance because, by his own admission, he is nosey. He likes to know how decisions really get made. He describes the work as less admin and more drama with a very good audit trail, full of personalities, politics with a small p, and the occasional plot twist. He teaches the human side of the boardroom as seriously as the rulebook, because he has watched perfectly compliant boards descend into chaos the moment nobody is willing to challenge anything.
There is one more thing. Out of university and in debt, John paid it down by winning more than fourteen thousand pounds across Weakest Link, Supermarket Sweep, Eggheads and The Chase. He has a gift for retaining information, much of it useless, all of it ready.
“If it is not written down properly, it did not happen. Or at least not in a way anyone can defend.”
Richard Poole is an accounting and finance specialist with more than twenty years spent teaching and marking the ICAEW, ACCA, ICAS and CIMA qualifications. As Managing Director of RJP Financial he lectures for providers worldwide, and he teaches financial reporting at Queen Mary University of London, where the PwC Flying Start programme he contributes to was named PQ Programme of the Year in 2025. He has helped write one of the most widely used taxation texts in higher education and built online courses now sold around the world.
He found financial accounting hard when he first learned it. That memory shapes how he teaches. He reassures students that there is no such thing as a silly question, and he uses plain explanations and real stories to make daunting ideas stick. He treats a set of accounts not as debits and credits, but as a story waiting to be understood.
His interest in governance came later, sharpened by hearing Erika Eliasson-Norris speak about her experience, which made him want to understand the field more deeply. Away from the classroom he is a lifelong sportsman who played semi professional football, and he draws his energy from team sport.
“Instead of seeing accounts as a series of debits and credits, think of them as a story waiting to be understood.”
Evon Chung is a Chartered Governance Fellow who has spent more than a decade bringing order to some of the most complex corporate structures in the world. As Manager of Global Corporate Services at Deel, she oversees the governance of around 350 entities across 125 jurisdictions, leading an international team of sixteen lawyers and governance professionals. Before Deel she held senior corporate secretarial roles at The Law Debenture Group and Eversheds Sutherland, running multi jurisdictional projects for FTSE 250 and Fortune 500 clients.
She has also sat on the other side of the exam paper. Some years ago, as a Subject Matter Expert for the Institute, she set and reviewed questions for the foundation level examination. She no longer does so, and her work with Campbell’s is purely as a tutor. The insight stays with her, and few tutors understand better what an examiner is looking for.
Evon came to governance by accident. An engineer by training, she joined a charity board of seventeen trustees, none of whom had a governance background, to help write the minutes. A few years later a law firm invited her into corporate secretarial work, and she never looked back. In a previous life she was a volunteer emergency ambulance technician, which taught her to stay calm under pressure, decide quickly on incomplete information, and know when to lead and when to hand over.
She teaches the Foundation Programme the way she would have wanted it taught to her — starting from first principles, building confidence early, and making sure no student feels out of their depth for long.
Marieclare Peter is a Chartered Governance Fellow who has built her career at the meeting point of governance, sustainability and financial services. She is Deputy Company Secretary of Monzo Europe, where she designs and runs governance frameworks for the board and its committees, and she advises senior leaders across banking on governance that keeps pace with a fast moving world. Her work spans board effectiveness reviews, transformation programmes and the thoughtful adoption of emerging technology, including AI.
She is twice a winner of the DMJ Governance Hot 100 as a Governance Trailblazer, and she won the ICSA Tom Morrison Essay Prize. Her MSc in Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability, completed with distinction, included research into the experience of company secretaries, a role she believes is still widely misunderstood. She is also an examiner for the Institute in another subject, so she knows the standard from the other side of the exam paper as well as the front.
Marieclare arrived in governance by a well told accident. She learned early that she would not make a great lawyer, spotted a trainee company secretary role, and has stayed for nearly a decade. The film The Big Short sharpened her sense of why governance matters and how badly its absence can end.
Away from the boardroom she runs on curiosity. She once ran a cake business, plays piano and sings, is learning Spanish, cooks in a kitchen for people who are homeless, and is devoted to her two cats.
“Anything that is governed requires governance. And governance directly correlates to outcomes.”
