Match members of your executive team with board members.
I’ve written before about board management as a required capability for every CEO. The goal and mindset should not be about preventing the board from causing trouble, but about getting the maximum contribution from every member of your board. After all, you’re paying them and spending time with them. Why wouldn’t you want to get the most value from them as you can? The question is, how do you do this?
A best practice I have covered before is the benefit of creating an annual cadence for your board meetings, with each meeting focusing on a different topic. For example, one meeting might focus on strategy and the next on talent. Your budget is a good topic for an end-of-year meeting, followed by one focused on risk management.
To further elevate the value of these topical meetings, one simple move is to build relationships between your board and executive leadership team members. You can do that by pairing each board member with one of your executives in a way that’s relevant to the topic at hand. Building relations of this type is particularly important for a succession candidate that the board will have to vet before hiring into the big job.
Let me show you what I mean.
Playing Matchmaker
One of the ways you can get the most value from your board is to assign one of your senior executives to each of your board members. Not only does this take some of the onus off you, as the CEO, to address questions or concerns that board members have before your next meeting, but it’s also a fantastic opportunity for board members to get to know the capabilities of your executives.
For example, you would want your CFO to team up with the board member who chairs the audit committee. For board members interested in compensation and people issues, pair them with your VP of HR. If you have a board member with a background in systems and technology, pair them with your CTO.
Again, your goal should be to assign an executive to each of your board members who are aligned and share a common area of expertise.
For instance, when the audit committee needs information, they reach out to their point of contact—the CFO. Similarly, if a question about compensation arises, they would contact your VP of HR for help.
This approach streamlines things for your board members and ensures you do not spend too much time chasing down information you would otherwise need to get from your executive team.
Avoiding Surprises
One of the things I learned while serving on the Junior Chamber of Commerce was that you should never go into a meeting unless you have the votes counted. In other words, you want to understand where the board stands and what’s on their minds before meeting them. You don’t want any surprises.
You can operationalize this by having your executives contact their assigned board members before each meeting to learn what questions or concerns they might have about hiring, capital expenditures, or expansion, and bring these issues to your attention before the meeting. This advanced work is a vital part of their job.
Now, I’m not suggesting that you, as CEO, avoid contacting your board. You still have an obligation to check in with them outside of board meetings. However, your executive assigned to that board member should handle about 75% to 80% of the communication with that board member, while you, as CEO, should cover the other 20%.
Of course, issues that a VP cannot address occasionally arise where you, as CEO, need to step in.
Dynamic Succession Planning
The beauty of pairing your executives with your board members is that, as they work together over time, your board will become much more familiar with your team and gain insight into their upside and capabilities. That can be extremely helpful for the board as they consider succession plans for who might eventually replace you as CEO.
At the same time, by working closely with the board, your team will gain the benefits and insights from their experience, helping them develop their capabilities faster. When you think of it in those terms, it’s a win-win-win strategy for the board, the company, and you as CEO.
