Francis Wade | Smash mediocre board performance through self-care

Imagine: You are a new member of a board. However, this team is a mediocre one and you want to intervene. Where should you start, given that this is your third meeting?

Only now do you realise that the poor performance you glimpsed in the first two sessions was no accident. To your dismay, this is a trend. You are mired in a low-performing team.

Fortunately, some colleagues seem to acknowledge the truth. They have agreed that there are outstanding issues which have persisted for years. To no avail. While they have initiated discussions to make improvements, nothing stuck.

Because of this, you are convinced that these are long-term challenges that cannot be addressed through a relaxed chat over drinks. Or a dose of motivational talk. Or even a well-written WhatsApp message or email. You need to act quickly. But how?

Fortunately, I recently stumbled across the work of local consultant A. Cecile Watson. Her ideas inspired the following reasons why your board requires a strategic plan for itself.

Boards must practise self-care. Usually, when we think of a board, the context is one in which this top group is serving the needs of the company. If all its members are aligned with the same definition of the role, then all is well.

Fortunately, small differences can be normalised. Maybe you’re familiar with the ‘form-storm-norm-perform’ model. The framework describes the four phases of teamwork and communication all groups must traverse.

However, in today’s world, boards are expected, from the beginning, to deal with VUCA matters, which stand for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. With no time to think, they are thrown into the deep end. Sometimes they might receive a technical briefing to bring them up to speed, but their individual and group development is left to chance.

After all, their purpose is to serve the organisation. Quickly. Even if they remain uninformed, and occasionally, lack key knowledge.

Watson puts this assumption to the test. Her recent Linkedin article argues that a board needs to examine itself if it wants to perform at a high level. In other words, just because a bunch of smart folks are on a board, does not mean their group IQ or EQ will be exceptional.

Actually, it has the potential to drastically decrease. Competent individuals often staff incompetent boards.

What does your team require? A new degree of self-care. From Watson’s point of view, a board is a kind of strategic business unit. Seen through this unique lens, this body should seek to manage its own performance in a pre-emptive fashion.

A failure to do so is a commitment to mediocrity.

A board must strategise … for itself. Normally, boards only engage in strategic planning with regard to the future of the organisation. By contrast, Cecile has come up with a brilliant twist on the old thinking.

Instead, your board is obligated to do its own planning, in service of its future. As a unit, it deserves to focus on itself.

This is not to say that it should ignore corporate planning. I have recommended in past columns that board members find their way into their company’s next retreat. They have to contribute to long-term direction.

But once that activity is over, I have seen where a board had to transform itself. In one client example, it meant cutting the average age and tenure of its members. Why did this become important?

In a nutshell, the organisation’s strategic plan demanded fresh, new ideas at the highest level.

A board in another client case, became slack. Its members attended meetings haphazardly, rarely performing the required preparation. Within a few years, this lack of accountability made its way into the organisation. Why? The board failed to provide a high standard, an example for others to follow.

Unfortunately, these aspirations won’t come from only doing board evaluations alone. Instead, Watson explains, only a written board strategy will work.

She recommends that boards define a vision for their team, plus pathways to get there. Also, it must create measurement and reporting mechanisms to ensure that the plan remains on track.

These steps may sound like a lot of overhead. For people who are busy and perhaps over-committed, it can feel overwhelming.

But this is more about the right mindset than it is a prescription for rigid actions. If your board applies these principles flexibly, it should save hours of heartache when challenges come up in the future.

In other words, there could be great gains to be made if you attend to the development of your board over time. As a unit, it could become more resilient, able to withstand a gradual drift into the mediocrity which afflicts so many corporate teams.

Francis Wade is a management consultant and author of Perfect Time-Based Productivity. To search past columns on productivity, strategy and business processes, or give feedback, email: columns@fwconsulting.com