Heidrick & Struggles report: “Board Monitor US 2024: Navigating shifting sands” shares insights from CEOs and non-executive directors about how they are navigating the increasingly challenging macro environment based on a recent global survey (38% North America).
Among the US-specific takeaways:
Allocation of meeting time
Consistent with the global results, more US respondents (68%) identified emerging technologies (including AI) as the topic on which the board has dedicated increased time compared to pre-COVID days than any other enumerated topic including cyber risk. Notably, organizational culture ranked fourth on the list at 57% (just above geopolitical volatility at 45%), while shareholder activism ranked last at 10%.
Not surprisingly, US respondents are less likely to spend time on sustainability and environmental risk than their global counterparts—34% and 25% of US respondents vs. 54% and 42% of global respondents, respectively.
Risk mitigation
Generally on par with global results, a majority of US respondents are managing risk and uncertainty post-COVID by spending more time talking with management about how they are managing risks and understanding and defining the risks they face as a board, while nearly half say they are requiring management to spend more time on understanding and defining the organization’s risks.
Additional strategies include briefing from or engaging external experts, adding issue-expert directors to the board, and establishing advisory committees on specific risks.
Board/workforce engagement
Marginally lower than the global response, more than 80% of US respondents favor director engagement with workforce below senior management, while just 17% say there should be no employee interaction.
In terms of what that engagement looks like, where provided, the US response compared to the global response is shown below.
Board involvement in operations
Most US respondents (but still less than the global average) indicated greater involvement by the board in operations than was the case historically, most often on an occasional basis and due to the need to learn more about the operational nature of the business than normal reporting permits.
See our recent report: “New Director Profile,” which outlines board diversity and other new director appointment trends among Fortune 500 boards.
This content first appeared in the Society Alert!