Empowering a Board that Plays Well Together

To start, once you’ve handpicked your board members based on their abilities and your company’s needs, you’ll need to start meshing personalities.

One absolute no-no is a lack of amicability. If you’re team isn’t working well with each other, nothing will ever get done. You need to look out for warning signs that will indicate disharmony amongst board members, as this can really hamper meetings and board morale. An example of a way to bypass issues between potential member-head-buttery is by assigning a chairman of the board. By having one facilitating member, your team will move more fluidly through meetings and generally be more respectful toward each other because they now have someone to answer to.

A potential issue for any board is when power is disproportional. If there is one person from a venture capital firm on the board that is throwing their weight around, that will create an imbalance. You can’t let the company’s business growth strategies get stimied by procedural issues with your board.

Boards that simply “get it” are way ahead of the competition in many regards. Not-so-coincidentally, companies with these sorts of boards are, too. Watch the full video from OpenView Labs for more information on this topic.