"There is very little in law/regulation that prescribes what a board should or shouldn’t do, but there is a lot of unhelpful habit and convention that drives us to the wrong place." At Board Intelligence, we'd encourage founders, CEOs, and chairs to be brave: tear up agendas and the status quo, and start with a blank sheet. Focus more time on strategy, the external market, innovation, changes in stakeholder dynamics, and less time on backward-looking operations, if you want to get more value out of your board time. - great debate in this thread, and wise words from our CEO, Pippa Begg.
Co-Founder & Chairman, Founders Forum Group, firstminute capital and Founders Factory. Previously co-founded and exited two unicorns.
European boards can be destructive or add gravitas and wisdom. Nik Storonsky was very open (in his recent talk with Timon Afinsky & Locals.org) that his VC board interfered and lacked experience. But hell there are no rules here, some VCs board members are key to founders’ success. I had mixed experiences both at lastminute.com and made.com - the pros were the gravitas and industry contacts that board members can add quickly; the cons were too much old world experience and sometimes a lack of humility to know what they didn’t know. The bad - my chairman trying to fire me; the good - I reversed it with 100% percent board support (including him changing his vote!). The bad - made.com board had too much old retail experience, along with VCs who overpaid and had a portfolio approach, the combination of which encouraged the company to take stock risk at just the wrong time, in order to have a chance to grow into a strong multiple for them. The result was many early investors got zero instead of a huge return…. Advisory boards can be a way to fix some of this in my experience, less time commitment means stronger people may accept to learn about an industry and the gravitas is still meaningful and door openers… Increasingly my takeaway from Nik’s answer to my question is that European board regulations hamper our startups. Busy people who hate governance tend to avoid European boards, and board members are mandated to interfere in the wrong ways…. Nik replaced his VC board members with experienced operators who genuinely understand the day-to-day challenges of running a startup. His move highlights an important truth: Boards aren’t just about filling seats with big names. They’re about assembling the right people who’ll stand by and guide you through the tough moments. Would you replace your board? Who has been your most valuable board member ? Did you delay having a board for as long possible? Do you think advisory boards are vanity trinkets or turbo charge growth?