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Climate Change: Five Considerations for BoardsIssue: 2020 Second QuarterClimate change is no longer abstract. Phenomena including raging wildfires in Australia and increasingly frequent “100-year” storms have proved that the impact on supply chains is real, and the potential long-term scenarios range from concerning to apocalyptic.Environment-related risks ranked as fiv...
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Coronavirus and CompensationIssue: 2020 Second QuarterThe sudden acceleration of the COVID-19 pandemic, with substantial economic damage to many industries, has companies scrambling to respond. The priorities, obviously, are to protect employees’ health, first and foremost, and to manage the risk to the business. But after taking those steps, some comp...
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Meeting the ChallengeIssue: 2020 Second QuarterLife has drastically changed for all of us, with a tectonic shift in how we live and breathe. We at Directors & Boards are committed to help you navigate through this unprecedented crisis and guide you toward a revived and renewed future.In this time of war, boards of directors need to demonstra...
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After CoronavirusIssue: 2020 Second QuarterLast year, Directors & Boards devoted its attention to the rising focus on environmental, social and governance issues (ESG) from institutional investors and others, culminating in our Character of the Corporation event last November. While much of the discussion surrounding ESG was illuminating...
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Leadership in RecoveryIssue: 2020 Second QuarterWhat an interesting time to be a leader, to say the least. I hope beyond hope that the curve of COVID-19 infections has flattened by the time you read this. But we really don’t know when that will happen, and such uncertainty makes leadership particularly difficult.By the beginning of April, we’ve a...
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‘First Reactions Aren’t Always the Best Reactions’Issue: 2020 Second QuarterFewer than a dozen people have served as Secretary of Homeland Security since the department was added to the Cabinet in 2003. Jeh Johnson is among the longest-serving, heading the department under President Barack Obama from 2013 to 2017.During his tenure, Johnson dealt with many of the same threat...
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Crisis Communications Should Focus on How Companies Help ConstituentsIn the rush to communicate with employees and customers about their responses to the novel coronavirus, many companies inadvertently led with their chins: “Your health and safety are our top priority.”It’s good to be caring and to assure others, but at issue is the potential for lawsuits where attor...
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Practical Tips for Virtual OversightAs the COVID-19 (novel coronavirus) outbreak continues to wreak havoc across the globe, boards of directors have a critical oversight role to play in helping their companies navigate through these uncertain times. That oversight function is complicated by the fact that the pandemic is evolving at li...
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COVID-19 and First Concerns for the BoardroomAs companies seek to understand and react to the particular ways in which the coronavirus pandemic may imperil their employees, operations and financial condition, there are certain key considerations that directors will likely be addressing as they, working together with management, support a varie...
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Helping You Navigate Through This CrisisA Message From the Publisher of Directors & BoardsWe at Directors & Boards are committed to helping you navigate through this unprecedented crisis and guiding you towards a revived and renewed future. First and foremost, we all need to be focused on the health, safety and well-bein...
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Opinion: The Crisis and the Activists and RaidersFor the past two weeks a number of activists and takeover raiders have sought to take advantage of the COVID-19 crisis by launching attacks on companies they view as vulnerable. Unlike the bedrock American companies drained by the crisis, there is ample dry powder in the coffers of some funds ...
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NACD Survey: Directors Recognize COVID-19 Disruption, Have Confidence in ManagementDirectors are digging into the risks and management response to the COVID-19 pandemic that has now taken root in the U.S.While new cases are dwindling in China, where the novel coronavirus originated, health officials say the worst is yet to come here. “Social distancing,” the practice of staying aw...
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Managing Strategic Risks in the Face of the CoronavirusThe outbreak and spread of the novel coronavirus has made reverberations around the world.It took less than three months for the virus to spread to tens of thousands in China, make its way to Europe and then to the United States. Markets responded with the worst weekly decline since the 2008 financi...
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Top of Mind: Roy Dunbar, Director for Humana Inc, Johnson Controls International PLC and SiteOne Landscape SupplyIssue: 2020 First QuarterLeading company boards will report in proxy filings for 2020 how they are responding to what they heard from shareholders in conversations the companies requested after the previous year’s filings.These companies will have solicited investors representing as much as 80% of their shares with an offer...
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Do Mandates Change Board Makeup?By April HallIn the first report since California's “Women on Boards” legislation went into effect, numbers are slightly up for gender diversity on publicly traded boards headquartered in the state, with 282 corporations reporting a female director appointment, compared to the 173 companies that had...
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Driving a Focus on RiskIssue: 2020 First QuarterRisk mania has taken over the corporate governance discussion today but defining risk and figuring out how to deal with it can be dizzying for boards.Dinesh Paliwal, the chief executive officer of Harman, a wholly owned subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Co., who serves on the boards of Bristol-Myers...
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The Character of the Corporation: 10 ways to get started on your ESG journeyIssue: 2020 First QuarterAmerica is experiencing record growth which has provided abundant jobs, wage growth and wealth generation for a majority of Americans. Yet income inequality and wealth disparity are alarmingly high, bringing into focus the challenge of attaining fair, equitable and sustainable growth as well as plac...
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The Character of the Corporation: A deep dive into our forum’s biggest questionsIssue: 2020 First QuarterAs most board members know, environmental, social and governance issues (ESG) are all the rage, with institutional investors putting pressure on public companies to think beyond maximizing value for shareholders by adding a focus on the impact of the corporation on its other stakeholders — including...
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Human Capital Governance: The Beginning of a New EraIssue: 2020 First QuarterThe era of human capital has arrived in the boardroom and, with it, the need for more thorough board oversight and governance of this mission-critical investment.As evidence, consider three current paradigm-shifting items:• Institutional investors are demanding that the companies they invest in pay ...
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Purpose, Human Capital and Profits: Five factors to drive enduring shareholder valueIssue: 2020 First QuarterRegardless of a board’s position on the purpose versus profits debate, human capital issues are an essential component of their discussions on how to drive shareholder value. Why? There are well-documented advantages to shareholders of having healthy, engaged, hard-working, and productive leade...