As we enter “Board Season” where the demand for new directors increases for December 31 year-end public companies, we have noticed, given our active board recruiting practice, two trends of expertise that Nominating Committees are seeking for potential candidates, extending beyond the requirements of compliance i.e. a financial expert for the audit committee.
Trend 1- The Talent Master
Boards are seeking candidates who have experience at leadership succession and who have a track record of courage on this “sensitive matter.”
This follows as boards recognize that the most important role of the Board and governance is selecting, guiding and evaluating the performance of their CEO and their company’s senior leadership team. Boards are seeking to better establish, and communicate, an ongoing process to turn an enterprise risk into an opportunity to strengthen its leadership, and continually align it to shareholder interests.
Accordingly, our clients are seeking “talent masters” with leadership and board experience, who have an appreciation of the diligence and discipline of such a process, and who link corporate governance with corporate leadership, while inclusive of the specifics and nuances to make succession considerations clear and effective.
Trend 2- Social Media and Web Commerce
Oftentimes, boards confuse these two phenomena and how to govern the high velocity of change where information moves at a rapid rate.
Virtually every board that retains us mentions the challenge of social media. Few boards understand it, as it covers internal matters and customer engagement, and thus have trouble framing the essence of defining what it is, and what its impact is, on the company they direct. Most see it as a continuously evolving enterprise risk, not something they can harness. While this is a concern, few boards are actually seeking directors with the requisite experience, as today that experience hardly exists, at least in candidates with the necessary maturity and gravitas to govern effectively.
Boards have turned their attention to seeking new directors with experience at customer engagement at a distance or a click, i.e. web commerce. Retailing trends are but one example, where the “sales-by-click” over the 2010 holiday period virtually doubled by 2011. Look at the impact technology is having on financial services, publishing, logistics, etc. It brings a new wave of opportunities, and yet for boards, there is a general discomfort in not having a director around the table with the eCommerce experience to ask the “right” questions at the “right” point, to help guide the discussion with company leadership on how best to strategically and operationally compete.
So, over the past six months, while relevant sector experience remains important, we have been asked to recruit new directors with this web commerce experience, emphasizing customer engagement, scalability, and retention. This trend will continue indefinitely.
About Us
With extensive experience in the boardroom, call on us to assist with your requirements to recruit directors and senior leadership. Our clients trust us with their “Sensitive Matters” which we conduct exceedingly well.