"The Digital Dilemma" from Spencer Stuart shares thoughtful insights from the firm's interviews with more than 30 board chairs on the considerations pertinent to adding a director with digital expertise to the board - with most opting for non-digital-expert directors with well-rounded and business-relevant experience, collaborative skills, good judgment, a willingness and ability to adapt to and problem solve for inevitable ongoing change, and the time necessary to devote to the director role, in lieu of a digital-expert director who may lack broad business experience and associated attributes and whose time may be largely consumed by an executive/operational role elsewhere.
In that most boards appear to favor a "collective responsibility" oversight approach supported by a capable management team, the article suggests a number of alternatives to digital-expert directors, including a dedicated board standing committee, board buddy (pairing directors with appropriate members of management/staff), advisory board, and retention of external advisors.