059 - Four Pillars of Good Board Governance with Prof. Didier Cossin

In this episode, we are joined by Founder and Director of the IMD Global Board Center, Prof. Didier Cossin. Didier is a global expert in governance, and in addition to his role at IMD has served as a consultant to the United Nations, the European Central Bank and multiple major corporations, including HSBC, Vodafone, Schlumberger and Coca-Cola. We speak about four pillars of good board governance: people, information, structure and  processes, and group dynamics.   What Was Covered Didier’s definition of board governance as “the art of decision making at the top of organizations” The particular challenge that corporations with a long history face to transform and how this requires board leadership that “breaks the internal mould, breaks bureaucracy and opens up to the world” What Didier has identified as the four pillars that constitute good governance – people, information, structure and processes and group dynamics - with good and bad examples of each Key Takeaways and Learnings A good assessment of board effectiveness is the extent to which it focuses on the past compared to the future – and that most boards spent too much time looking back A board must ensure it receives the proper balance of internal and external information, of formal and informal information. That the very best board packs are “synthetic” – they use a variety of tools to synthesize the information that tracks the evolution of the key metrics The criticality of the difficult task of organizing a board so its committees are well structured and focused on the issues of most importance to the organization How a Chairman needs have the “art” of stimulating the right discussions, ensuring all views are considered and bringing these together – and the importance of this to enabling a functioning organization Links and Resources Mentioned in this Podcast Get in touch with Prof. Didier Cossin via LinkedIn and email: didier.cossin@imd.org  IMD Business School for Leadership and Management Courses - www.imd.org  IMD Global Board Center - https://www.imd.org/board/board-center/  The list of Prof. Didier Cossin's articles and publications