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THE BOARDSPAN LIBRARY
The Boardspan staff reviews and selects the most informative articles from business news sources, including:





We categorize articles to make them easier for you to find.
- Exec. evaluation & comp
- Critical information about evaluating and compensating the executive team.
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Featured
A Checklist for Boards in the New Normal
Covid-19 has spurred corporate boards to improvise new practices while keeping those that have served them well. Here’s a run-down.
Boards make decisions that have a long-term impact on companies. In a survey of 266 chairs, directors and CEOs in 23 countries between May and June to assess how boards have adapted to the coronavirus pandemic, we found that the pandemic had cemented some long-existing ...read more...
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Featured
Integrated Corporate Governance: Six Leadership Priorities For Boards Beyond The Crisis
The Covid-19 crisis is accelerating a shift toward a more integrated approach to corporate governance that has been gathering force for some time. The pandemic has put people’s lives, livelihoods and learning at the center of the public policy and business response in almost every country and industry sector. It has dramatically underscored the need for firms to engage proactively ...read more...
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Featured
Dear Board Member: Your job just became even more important
Friends,
Yes, we’re living in times of uncertainty with the weight of the unknown bearing down on all of us. Together we’re facing unprecedented challenges, and together we will work our way through them. As a board member, your leadership has never been more needed.
In this spirit, we share our collective wisdom to help our community of board members be the beacons of le ...read more... -
Featured
Audit: Radical Change on the Horizon?
Audit committee chairs may find resonance in the phrase “tragedy of the horizon”, an expression coined in 2015 by Bank of England governor Mark Carney, which refers to the paradox that arises when market actors must take urgent action to address a long-term risk—but have no observable short-term incentive to do so. Carney was talking about climate change. But his warning can be read as a routine job description for boa ...read more...
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Featured
Agitators and Reformers: How to Respond to Activist Investors
Arguably, the single best way to ruin a CEO’s day is to report that an activist is on the phone and has just taken a position in the CEO’s company.
More and more CEOs are getting this call, as activist investing has exploded in recent years. We examined more than 400 activist engagements and found that the targets are getting larger and the industries more diverse. We also found that the ac ...read more...
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Featured
Hiring For Cultural Fit At The Top
Bringing a new C-level executive on board is always fraught with risk: Any misstep can be expensive and embarrassing. As a result, companies may play it safe by looking for someone with just the right CV or perhaps a recent stint at a high-flying competitor. Who does the board like? What will the analysts think?
The challenge has become even more daunting as an increasing number of companies use their culture as a point of diff ...read more...
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Featured
CEO's Guide To Working With A Board
Once you have recruited or re-structured your board of directors as part of the financing, make sure to establish a good working relationship with them.
Board meetings with your directors
You must hold regular board meetings to discuss the business of your company. The following tips from Guy Kawasaki’s The Art of the Start and Reality Check can guide you as you cultivate your board, especially wi ...read more... -
Featured
Planning Ahead – The Board’s Role in Crisis Management
The past few years have provided numerous examples of the costs, both financial and reputational, that can accompany corporate mismanagement of an emergency or crisis situation. From product recalls to environmental disasters to conduct by senior executives that call their integrity into question, it is almost a given that every public company board has confronted or will have to confront an emergency or ...read more...
FEATURED ARTICLES

Overboarding is not always top of mind for boards, but considering the elevated risk that can reasonably result and what research has revealed, it should be a stronger concern for mitigation and reputation purposes. There has not been a clear and universal definition of the problem, though one...

In light of evolving—and sometimes actively debated—perspectives on the role of public companies with respect to sustainability, corporate social responsibility and other ESG matters (e.g., Barron’s recent report on Sustainable Investing), we are providing a high-level overview of how boards of d...

As technological, social and financial disruptions roil one industry after the next, boards of directors see the potential for crisis around every bend. Even the best corporate overseers recognize that prevention alone is not enough—boards must anticipate and be prepared to guide companies dealin...

With complexity, uncertainty, and rapid change dominating the business landscape, the expectations placed on boards are shifting, and fast. Put simply, board members are expected to do more, do it better, and take greater accountability than ever before. Boardspan’s Top 10 list calls out the issu...

A Q&A with Abby Adlerman, CEO of Boardspan. Notably, 15 of Boardspan’s 20 most recent board placements are women. Q: What do you think of California’s SB826, the bill that would require the boards of directors of public companies domiciled in California to include at least one woman director b...

Anyone who has ever gone to the “investors” section of a company’s website knows that corporate governance is not the sexiest of topics. While it seems that almost every category of people and/or type of profession has become fair game for reality television, one of the last safe places may actua...

The regulatory landscape around these issues is changing, and company leaders need to know. Board members are at risk of being seen as negligent — and therefore potentially accountable — if they fail to pay adequate attention to environmental and human rights issues. In 2015, regulators exp...

A guide to steering companies effectively through the crisis and beyond. Corporate boards across Europe are reacting to the coronavirus pandemic in three ways. For some, it’s business as usual. “Crisis is the business of the CEO; the board does not need to adjust its workings,” the chair of on...

Regardless of a company’s success or confidence in its strategy, management, and board, there are few situations public companies face that are more daunting than an unsolicited approach by an activist investor. And with activist activity continuing to rise—2018 saw a record number of companies t...

Every board wants its CEO to thrive--and there’s one simple thing all boards can do to improve the odds: Offer FEEDBACK. It’s surprising how many boards expect top performance from their executives, but only give feedback when they have a specific disagreement or concern about performance metrics...

“To take notes or not to take notes—that is the question” often asked in corporate board rooms today. As a matter of good governance, it is important that the minutes serve as the single, clear, official record of each in-person or telephonic board and committee meeting. Board materials that are ...

Covid-19 has spurred corporate boards to improvise new practices while keeping those that have served them well. Here’s a run-down. Boards make decisions that have a long-term impact on companies. In a survey of 266 chairs, directors and CEOs in 23 countries between May and June to assess how ...