ALL HAIL THE BOARD

The Board of Directors; the overseers of governance, resource allocations, budgets, targets, remuneration; and responsibility for the hiring and firing of the big chair occupant.

No wonder the very utterance of the words, “The Board”, strikes such fear and trepidation into the hearts of executives and staff!

Even the most vociferous of executives and senior managers who argue their cases so stridently and confidently to peers and subordinates go weak at the knees at the very sight of a Board Member entering the office domain.

But like the riddle of who audits the auditors, if you are the authority, who is it exactly that is testing the veracity of the arguments, questioning the soundness of assumptions, the rationale behind the strategies and the wisdom of the decision-making?

With the executive laying out the red carpet and senior staff heads bowed in subservience akin to the medieval traditions of serfdom, the answer is often no-one! It can become a case of The Emperor’s New Clothes in the famous Hans Christian Andersen tale, with the Board so enamoured by their own infallibility, because no-one is telling them otherwise, that the company can find itself in dire straits with little forewarning.

Some of the smartest business minds in Australia sit on the Boards of our publicly listed and major not-for-profit organisations and do an admirable job steering companies through the turbulent waters of corporate competition and regulation. Conversely, there are Boards comprised of bumbling incompetents who are either there for the wrong reasons, or just not up to the task.

Some of the antics and behaviours of Boards resemble a scene from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves:

There's Drowsy, who finds it difficult to get through the first page of the previous meeting’s minutes without heavy lids descending. Hungry, who just comes along for the sandwiches. Dopey, who does not grasp what the business does and either nods constantly or asks an endless series of stupid questions. The wicked Queen, a role usually superbly played by a male megalomaniac Chairperson.  Finally, there’s Nasty, who wants to throw thier weight around humiliating those of lesser standing in front of a room full of others.

There are all the fringe benefits and out-and-out freebies that come with the territory: business-class travel and luxurious accommodation, free technology; petrol cards, meals at the best restaurants in town – venues where they discuss the next minimum pay increase for the company’s workforce. The irony is that the people who can most afford to put their hands in their pockets and pay for their own way are gifted it free of charge as further reward on top of the lucrative remuneration many already receive as payment for a few days’ work a month.

The moral of Andersen’s fable sees the Emperor vowing to not be so vain, to take his position of authority more seriously and act with humility - timeless advice indeed for any sitting or aspiring members of a Board.

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