Building Board Expertise for What Comes Next

What do you do when the expertise your board needs is changing faster than its membership?

A thoughtful board skills analysis can identify which areas of expertise matter most, how well represented they are today and where the most consequential gaps lie. But its value extends beyond identifying gaps. It provides a foundation for more informed succession decisions—often well before the next vacancy arises.

Our CEO, Abby Adlerman, often likens board succession planning to solving a Rubik's cube: every move affects the other pieces. An anticipated director departure may create an opportunity to add expertise the board will need, but also leave a gap in committee leadership. Moving another director into that role may solve one need but can reveal a different gap to address elsewhere. And the timing of each decision matters.

A comprehensive board skills analysis helps make those interdependencies visible. By examining the depth and distribution of director expertise, its importance to the company's future and the timing of expected departures, boards gain a stronger foundation for developing a practical succession roadmap.

Three considerations can help frame those decisions:

• Not every skills gap is a seat gap. Some expertise needs to sit on the board. Some simply needs to be accessible to it.
• What's missing—and what may matter less. Today's strengths may not be the expertise the company needs most three to five years from now.
• The timing of the gap matters. Not every future skill is needed today. Knowing when it will matter changes the options available.

Each involves judgment calls and trade-offs, particularly when the expertise the board wants and the seats available don't neatly line up.

The following considerations illustrate how the findings of a deeper skills analysis can help boards navigate those decisions.

1. Not every skills gap is a seat gap

An area of expertise can matter to the board without necessarily requiring a dedicated seat.

An emerging field, for example, might initially be something directors need to understand well enough to ask the right questions and oversee management effectively, but not something that requires deep expertise from a director sitting at the table. The board might get what it needs through management briefings, external advisors, targeted director education or specialist input brought into selected discussions.

But that calculation can change.

Three years later, that same expertise could be so fundamental to the company's strategy, risk profile or business model that direct board-level experience becomes considerably more important.

AI offers an obvious example. A board may initially need enough fluency to understand how the company is using it, where the opportunities and risks lie, and what questions to ask of management. As AI becomes more deeply embedded in the business, however, access to outside expertise may no longer provide the depth the board needs. What began as knowledge the board needed around the table could become expertise it wants at the table.

So when a skills analysis reveals a gap, the question isn't necessarily who to recruit. It may be more useful to ask:

How important is this expertise? How deeply does the board need to understand it? Does it need to sit at the table today—or simply be brought reliably into the room? And could that answer change over time?

2. What's missing—and what may matter less

Composition discussions naturally gravitate toward gaps: What don't we have enough of? But succession planning also raises the opposite question: Which areas of expertise that matter today may matter less to where the company is going?

Imagine a company whose historic growth was driven predominantly through physical distribution but whose next phase depends increasingly on digital channels, data and new business models. The board's existing commercial expertise remains valuable. But the mix of experience it needs may look different going forward.

That becomes particularly relevant as directors approach the end of their service. Rather than assuming a departing director's expertise needs to be replicated, the board can consider that seat in the context of its future needs.

What are we losing? And what could we gain?

Boards cannot add a seat for every newly desirable skill. Over time, composition is an exercise in rebalancing a finite number of seats. An anticipated departure can therefore be an opportunity not simply to replace what is leaving, but to add expertise the board may need next.

Getting clear on what may matter less can be just as important to succession planning as identifying what's missing.

3. The timing of the gap matters

A board identifies three important gaps in expertise. One is critical to a strategic decision the company will make this year. One is likely to become increasingly important over the next two years. The third will matter primarily if the company successfully executes a longer-term strategic shift.

Those aren't three identical gaps. And they shouldn't necessarily lead to three searches.

The first may require expertise to be brought into the boardroom immediately—even if no seat is available. The second may align naturally with a director expected to leave in the next two years. The third may simply need to remain visible as the board looks further ahead.

This is where the findings of a skills analysis begin to inform a succession roadmap.

Once the board understands which areas of expertise it may need and when, it can consider those needs alongside foreseeable changes in board composition: expected director departures, committee leadership transitions, rotations and other opportunities to adjust the mix over time.

The decisions are interconnected. A director's anticipated departure may open a seat for expertise the company will need in two years, while also creating a committee leadership gap. Moving another director into that role may affect the experience available on a different committee—or require time to prepare a future chair. A detailed picture of where expertise resides, how deeply it is represented and when it may leave helps the board assess those trade-offs before a vacancy forces the issue.

From skills analysis to succession plan

A comprehensive skills analysis provides a clearer picture of the board's expertise today and how well it aligns with where the company is going. Its value for succession planning lies in bringing several dimensions together: which skills matter most, how deeply they are represented, where gaps may emerge and when the board may need to address them.

Expected director departures, committee rotations and leadership transitions add another layer. Viewed alongside the skills analysis, they can reveal natural opportunities to adjust the board's mix of expertise over time—and potential conflicts that deserve attention well in advance.

Not every gap will require recruitment. External advisors, targeted director education or specialist input may provide expertise while a need is still emerging. Committee changes can make better use of experience already around the table. In some circumstances, temporarily expanding the board may create room for important new expertise while preserving institutional knowledge.

Taken together, these insights help turn a snapshot of the board today into a more deliberate, adaptable succession roadmap.

But that roadmap doesn't have a fixed destination.

There is no enduring ideal board composition. Strategies evolve. New risks and opportunities emerge. Expertise that seems peripheral today may become central; other expertise may become relatively less important. Directors join and leave, changing the mix around the table and across committees.

That makes taking stock of board composition an ongoing part of board work—not an exercise reserved for an impending vacancy or director search. Periodically revisiting the expertise the company needs, how well it is represented and where adjustments may be valuable helps keep board composition connected to the business it oversees.

Often, those adjustments will be incremental: adding particular expertise as a seat becomes available, developing directors already on the board, shifting committee responsibilities or drawing on outside specialists while a need is emerging.

The objective isn't constant refreshment. It is to keep the board's collective expertise evolving alongside the company, so directors remain well positioned to contribute to the challenges and opportunities ahead.

Download This Article

Get a PDF version of this article