I am lucky enough to attend a forum of chairs and directors from deep tech startup companies.
Each month we extract from our collective som new ideas to improve our practice.
#1 – Consider a written narrative instead of slides. Like Amazon’s now-famous six page memos, a different clarity can come from a story.
#2 – Send a Loom video of the CEO talking through the pre-read to put some context behind the data and minimise the need for talking through the pack in the meeting itself.
#3 – Show a burn-down chart that shows the day that the business runs out of money and overlay before and after lines for changes since the last meeting.
#4 – Label pre-read pages in the pack to be clear what the meeting will expect directors to have read vs those that will be formally discussed in the meeting.
#5 – Use Culture Amp to pulse check the team culture and show a report routinely in every board pack. Show changes. This is a low touch way for boards to track people issues without requiring management interpretation.
#6 – Build out a board pack from actual management reports and dashboard where possible to avoid extra work for board meetings. We should all be tracking the same things with the same clarity anyway.
#7 – Track impact of board decisions with metrics. Too often boards make decisions that are not followed up for progress over time. “6 months ago we decided X – here’s what is happening in the data”.
A CEO can’t lead the board as well as the company
Perhaps a controversial statement given that it is common (especially in the US) for the CEO to be the Chair of a startup. But the role of chair is a specific function.
️ “One of my core jobs is to give the CEO oxygen.” Peter James – Chairman of Macquarie Telecom and Droneshield.
I chair a number of boards and have trusted relationships with the company’s CEOs. Indeed, when this trust falls away – which it can do – I do what I need to do to get it back quickly. The job is impossible without it.
What we do together
Photo: AdobeStock
The Chair manages the conversation and owns the task of getting decisions made. The CEO can focus on listening, understanding and providing insight. We hold each other accountable for delivering on our function.
We agree the desired outcome of a meeting in advance and collaborate on ensuring that the papers and the pre-work are ready to get to that outcome in the meeting.
We know which directors to spend time with between meetings. We know who can inform a decision the most and who has the most at stake around it. Then we do the work to get the meeting content and structure ready for the right discussion.
We agree on how to use the skills of directors outside of a board meeting to get the most out of their expertese and experience.
The relationship between a CEO and a Chair manages an unavoidable tension that is always present between those that govern a business and those that run the business. The same board room can feel like ‘going to the Principal’s office’ or like a special place where we all get sharper.
An effective chair needs to get that balance right.
Dinner decompression for boards
A board is unsettled when it reconvenes. Questions and concerns that may have been seeded weeks ago have started to grow in the minds of directors. With the best intention in the world, directors still worry that management has not considered important factors, or has failed to see something obvious to them.
Some have read the board pack from cover to cover and come with a folder of scribbled notes. Others have not read it at all and enter with their opinion. Most are distracted about the multitude of other projects that flow through their lives.
A crucial job of the board chair is to start a board meeting with a calm and focused board that is ready to understand, provide insight and make the best decisions for the company.
Photo: AdobeStock
I’ve found the best way to do this is to go out for dinner the night before. Directors chat while walking to venue, mingle in different groups over drinks and start to surface ideas that are top of mind in an environment that is more relaxed at the dinner table.
Directors offload issues that are important to them and topics come up that may have not been seen when the agenda was assembled. We prepare our minds to enter the same meeting, not a seperate agenda for each director.
The job of the CEO and Chair is to listen and be curious about topics they have missed or under-baked.
Now the meeting is ready to begin the next day. Concerns have been de-pressurised and the focus os clear. Directors begin the meeting confident that there is alignment on what topics are important and the knowledge that they will be covered.
If everyone disagrees with you, leave the board
If a board does one thing well, it must help a company to move forward.
Velocity is everything in a company that is starting up, and probably burning capital every day on the journey to product market fit. If boards disagree and defer decisions to the next meeting, they are making a business weaker.
Photo: AdobeStock
Sometimes this is because the whole board has a question. That probably suggests that there is a problem with the strategy which needs some more work. The action here is to agree on what needs to be done to get to clarity and then re-convene as soon as possible to make a decision.
Sometimes there is one director in the way. Sometimes that director is me and I am hyper-aware that I am a blocker. When this happens, I need to understand why I disagree and communicate as clearly as possible why that is so that the issue can be addressed quickly.
If it is addressed quickly, it makes the company sharper. It is a contribution. If I alone block the way forward, I am making the company weaker, even if I believe my position is valid.
Sometimes single directors have a different position on decisions quite often. Sometimes that has been me. Now I think it may be time to leave a board.
Not to storm out in an act of protest, but to acknowledge that I am making the company weaker by creating a tension on the board and slowing down the company.
I hold myself to that accountability. Company first.
A tool for fragmented boards to act as a single decision-making engine
David Thodey (Chair of Xero, Ramsey Healthcare, former CSIRO Chair) once told me that the Chair’s main job is to know how a board makes decisions and lead the process to become good at it.
I keep coming back to that idea, but it can be challenging to deliver because:
Individuals can dominate: Boards are generally populated with smart, opinionated individuals.
We’re intellectually conflicted: Directors can be torn between responsibilities they have in other organisations – such as being a shareholder as an investor in the company – and their role as a director.
We forget: Some boards have 3 months between meetings.
I have found that companies that bring a ‘Plan on a Page’ to the front of their board packs tend to avoid these issues.
Usually it doesn’t need to be spoken to. It’s just present for all as a recent reminder of a what the thousands of decisions came before this moment has led us to as a company.
Here’s what it needs to include:
Why we are here. Our mission.
How we do it. Our unique approach to delivering valuu to customers.
What we do. The products we make.
Our focus. What we are concentrating on in this period.
Metrics. Tracking how we are doing with our focus.
From here, it is hard to introduce distractions and opinions that are off-piste.
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