The prime focus of electoral management and its most publicly visible activity is to organize and operate facilities that will provide an opportunity for all eligible persons to participate, through voting, in the choice of their representatives in their institutions of governance.

As voting is generally a geographically dispersed activity which often has to be organized and implemented within very tight time frames, providing a cost-effective voting service for all eligible voters whilst maintaining high standards of integrity, security and professionalism is a major challenge to electoral management bodies.

The Voting Operations Encyclopaedia topic deals with the essential business of recording votes. It focuses on the secrecy of and accesses (freedom and opportunity) to voting. Voting Operations considers issues relating to electoral legislation and management, administrative regulations, technology and shared responsibility for such operations.