Summary
Boards of directors play two roles. They must protect value by helping companies avoid unnecessary risks, and they must build value by ensuring that the companies change quickly enough to address emerging competitive threats, evolving customer preferences and disruptive technologies.
As technology and business model cycles become shorter, and companies face unrelenting pressure to innovate or suffer the consequences, more and more boards need to focus on the second of these roles. To do so, they must be willing to challenge executive teams and stress-test their strategies to ensure they go far enough and fast enough. For boards used to preserving the status quo, this shift can be uncomfortable.
In this Executive Insights, L.E.K. Consulting discusses four ways boards can become better challengers and champions of change.
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