CTTG is a strategy consultancy focused on supporting Boards, Directors and Governance Professionals through workshops and coaching as they develop change strategies and lead their implementation. I founded CTTG 25 years ago and work with a network of trusted colleagues to serve my clients from a wide range of sectors and geographies included multi-nationals, SMEs., start-ups and government bodies
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The prevailing condition for many leaders is fatigue, overload and energy loss. Individuals are required to be resilient and persist against all odds.
Articles proliferate with advice on prioritising rest and ‘playtime’. There are no universal solutions. We each bring unique strengths and perceptions to the situations we face, so a personalised approach to finding our tonic(s) is essential.
For the musically inclined, Tonic is the first note of a scale and is most important because it serves as the focus for melody and harmony.
So what is the first note of your sound track? What signal does it send? What lifts your spirits and makes your feet dance?
In my search for music to feed my spirits I look for artists and gigs in smaller venues. Over the last few months, serendipity has led to the happy discovery of talented performers from around the World. Recent advice has come from many sources including the curious taxi driver taking us to a recent gig and sharing the long and impressive list of musicians he has seen this year.
For the active, Tonics are ‘the activities which invigorate and sustain us.’
The current focus on health and well-being practices provides an extensive list of alternatives. Choosing wisely and developing sustainable habits takes effort.
For decades I have protected time for swimming. Involving very early starts, the habit provides both exercise and a precious opportunity to reflect. Colleagues and friends have chosen walking, cycling, yoga and running. On Sunday, London will celebrate the 2024 Marathon attracting entrants of all ages running for multiple causes. We will be there cheering their efforts. A tonic for all supporters and participants.
For the epicureans, ‘eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die.’ is an appealing philosophy. Tonics are the ‘medicinal’ substances which lift our spirits. Tonics are restorative, reviving, stimulating or invigorating,
In these health conscious times, ginger shots and electrolyte tablets seem to be a popular alternative to cake and wine. Make wise choices seems to be good advice.
And for all of us as we seek tonics to provide harmony for our body, mind and spirit, what about:
The tonic of laughter?
Being part of a community?
The company of friends?
Stimulating and rewarding ‘work’?
As we spring into Spring, let’s all make time to find our own tonic(s).
While clearing winter flower beds and trying to identify bulbs, serendipity found me listening to a radio broadcast by the Astronomer Royal, Lord (Martin) Rees. He was discussing NASA’s mission to Mars and describing the robots sent to gather scientific data on the surface of the red planet. The first, sent in 2011 was named Curiosity. It moved across Gale crater and Mount Sharp slowly in one direction. A successor named Perseverance was sent in 2220 and was designed to move around objects.
Curiosity and Perseverance are two of the perennially cited strengths required for organisation and leadership success and certainly for gardeners.
Curiosity
Natural curiosity is the behaviour we admire in children and often blame external factors for limiting in ourselves. Perhaps we should ask ourselves if we are self- limiting our natural curiosity?
To develop an organisation’s curious mind takes effort and active leadership. Capturing the imagination and energy of all by role modelling curiosity in action, encouraging and enabling the behaviour in others. In organisations with high levels of trust, individuals may have greater confidence to explore and an inclination to share discoveries with colleagues.
Curiosity needs to be sustained in times of great uncertainty. Defined as ‘a strong desire to know or learn something’ the concept of curiosity is central to motivation. Strengths Profile assesses the extent to which you are ‘interested in everything, constantly seeking out new information and learning more.’
Perseverance
There are several aspects to perseverance. The current focus on individual and organisational resilience is just one. Resilience is the strength to take hardships and setbacks in your stride, recovering quickly from adversity. A second aspect is the strength to persist, to achieve success by keeping going when confronting difficulties. And finally, we see examples of individuals and organisations who use adversity to spur them on to greater efforts and achievements. They bounce back from setbacks.
Health check:
Where do you look for new ideas?
How do you reflect on and apply new thinking?
How do you acknowledge and share your discoveries?
What and who helps you to keep going when you face challenges?
How do you overcome setbacks?
How do you use setbacks to spur you on?
What can you do now to nurture the enablers of curiosity and perseverence?
What new habit would you like to develop?
And for the curious gardeners, I have persevered and finally found my garden planting plans. These tiny green shoots are snowdrops, transplanted last year to form new clumps.
After a busy month spent judging awards, in conversation with alternative thinkers and reviewing research from business analysts and academics, one key question emerges as preoccupying business leaders:
‘How do we think, decide and act in the long term interests of our organisation?’
Strategic thinking
Our attempts to imagine alternative futures require curiosity and creativity. We bring together a range of interested parties and share insights and dreams. When we encourage diversity of thinking, our biases and pre-conceptions are challenged. Shrewd boards ensure that they are composed of individuals who bring a range of perspectives to the exploration and discussion of strategy.
These ingredients appear simple but are complex to engineer. The currency and contribution of each thinker are critical. This raises complex questions about refreshing board membership and planning succession. Offboarding directors involves difficult but honest conversations in the interests of the organisation’s future. Onboarding directors is an art form, best tailored to the needs of each individual to ensure they can contribute as soon as they are ready.
Our ability to look ahead also requires us to understand our past. We therefore need to ensure that corporate memory informs our discussions but doesn’t prevent imaginative thinking beyond a simple extrapolation of our current approaches.
We are often reminded that listening to the business and its stakeholders is an essential part of any strategic thinking activity. When these conversations go beyond mechanistic process and take place in a culture of trust, they provide valuable intelligence.
Strategic decision making
Your governance framework identifies the roles and responsibilities for strategic decision making but ultimately the responsibility for the strategic direction of your organisation rests with the board. When your board is only used as a ratifier of strategy, valuable opportunities to contribute experience, challenge and stress test assumptions may be missed. A dialogue between horizon scanners and operational experts generally produces robust decisions.
Award winning organisations, projects and initiatives share a common factor in that they are able to clearly articulate ‘value delivered’ and ‘impact’ against defined criteria. Where decisions are made with no clear rationale or intention, tracking performance is problematic.
Among the decision criteria receiving significant attention are cultural fit and risk appetite. Strategic decisions which are aligned to the beliefs and values of your organisation are more likely to engage the support of those responsible for delivering them. Equally, those decisions which are perceived to be contrary to the shared understanding of ‘how we do things around here’ are likely to meet obstacles. Given that the Board are tasked with creating the tone in their organisation, the debate around whether a decision is ‘right for us’ is critical.
Having set the risk appetite of your organisation, the board can assess strategic decisions against clearly defined tolerances. The wise ensure that risk appetite is kept under regular review and does not constrain the selection of innovative options with the potential to deliver value.
Enabling living strategy
Strategy is merely window dressing if action is missing. Effective strategy formulation involves and engages those who are accountable for delivery. By the time the strategy is launched, a critical mass of enthusiasts can be ready to inspire and encourage their colleagues to deliver the required value and impact.
Effective monitoring involves tracking quantified performance metrics and listening to the real voices along your value chain. Together these practices create focus and sustain momentum. Importantly, they may provide early insight into strategy modifications required and, in some cases, obsolescent activities and initiatives which should be stopped. A continuous appraisal of resource deployment enables agile redeployment where appropriate.
It takes effort to provide opportunities for board members to be visible sponsors of strategy. ‘Walking the floor’ may result in valuable conversations when leaders encourage the transparent sharing of opinions and capture intelligence for discussed with their colleagues.
The potential for intrapreneurship is often neglected by organisations. If curious and creative individuals are not valued and nurtured, they go elsewhere taking their insights and dreams with them. There is merit in identifying individuals with the natural strengths to think strategically and generate innovative and creative ideas. By exposing them to board thinking, your organisation can increase the probability of retaining their talents.
A quick healthcheck
What contribution do you make to strategic thinking?
How do you enable other contributions?
Who encourages you to be imaginative?
What metrics do you use to evaluate different strategic options?
How do you stress test your strategic decisions before ratifying them?
Who ensures that strategic decisions, once taken, have collective board support?
How do you show support for those who are accountable for delivery?
What involvement do you have in tracking performance against strategic objectives?
When and how are strategic decisions reviewed and modified?
My picture shows the Kerry Peninsula in Western Ireland taken from the Dingle Peninsula. Do you focus on the surf hitting the shore along the impressive 5 km Inch Strand; the sparkling track of light across Dingle Bay; the mountains of the Ring of Kerry or the extraordinary variety of cloud formations. Do you anticipate the arrival of Storm Agnes moving across the Atlantic Ocean and due to hit Western Ireland a few hours after I captured this picture. For those of you who have joined me virtually, you will have seen my library of cloud formations used as backgrounds. My eyes are drawn to the far horizon and then move to the foreground before widening to encompass the whole picture.
Many ‘experts’ have long advocated that we need to hold different horizons in mind at the same time, among them McKinsey 3 Horizons Model
What we naturally focus on is not automatically the same as colleagues. We each have a unique strengths profile which includes our propensity to focus on detail and our ability to see strategic horizons. What may seem obvious to one person may be obscure to another. Cognitive diversity is prized as contributing to better thinking and decision making. Creating an environment in which different perspectives are honestly shared is an essential foundation to effective governance by boards.
It takes effort to hold now, soon and the future in mind. When times are tough, the frequent response is to focus on survival now. The business challenges of the past five years have provided stories of organisations managing crises effectively but failing to think beyond the immediate situation.
We are also aware of imaginative businesses that made tough decisions about activities they needed to modify or stop and others they needed to invest in and launch. Courage, curiosity and creative thinking characterised the successful navigators. Importantly, the leaders in these businesses demonstrated an interest in and empathy with their internal and external stakeholders, engaging in continuous conversations and providing a strong sense of purpose and direction.
Wise boards are able to shift their focus according to priorities. Increasingly they consider immediate matters requiring their decision making and strategic issues for reflection and discussion at each board meeting. The practice of separating strategic thinking and planning to an annual or six-monthly event can prevent the entrepreneurial and opportunistic leadership required in volatile times.
Where trust exists between the board, the business and it’s stakeholders, it lays the foundation for empowered operators to make responsive decisions to adapt and meet the requirements of their markets. Tracking performance, recognising contributions and celebrating adaptability are important board activities, which create focus and sustain momentum in their businesses. They require the visible and inspirational involvement of directors with genuine curiosity and a desire to listen and learn.
Returning to the picture above, what did you see? The following situational questions provide food for thought about focus:
Now – presenting situation.
Q: What is the tide state and when will it turn?
Q: What time of day is it and where is the sun positioned?
Q: What is the air pressure and visibility level?
Soon – emerging themes.
Q: How soon will the light change – sunset time?
Q: What is the wind direction and speed?
Q: What weather fronts are expected, when and what severity?
Later- alternative developments.
Q: What are the levels of erosion impacting the coastline and how will global warming impact the communities living on the coast of Western Ireland?
Q: How will the local seafaring industries – fishing and tourist excursions – be impacted by changes to the sea and weather conditions?
Q: How can the community of Dingle Peninsula adapt to changes in their natural environment?
Expertise takes effort to achieve. It can carry recognition, qualifications and position. The danger is always to rest on our laurels.
Our expertise must be relevant and relevance is impacted by changes to the context in which our expertise will be applied.
Staying current takes continuous and consistent effort.
September seems to be the month when clients ask me this question. Perhaps a Summer break has provided time to reflect and individuals have returned with a renewed appetite for auditing their currency. Quarter four will certainly be a busy one for boards with increased regulatory and legislative requirements to fulfil and contemporary thinking to apply.
Three habits to develop and nurture:
Develop curiosity and healthy scepticism. Many thought leaders highlight the importance of investing time in reading and listening. In a busy world with continuously shifting priorities and deadlines, protecting this time requires our active commitment and regular practice. We also need to avoid living in an echo chamber where only inputs which support our world view manage to get through the natural filters we apply.
Recognise the changes which are material. Tools exist to enable us to focus on what is relevant for us now and for the future. These need to be imaginatively rather than mechanistically applied. When we set filters to help focus our efforts, it is important to recognise that they need monitoring. We also need to be realistic about our capacity to track changes and avoid noise. Our efforts are enhanced when we identify sources which provide aggregated and unbiased insights and learn to recognise patterns and interconnections.
Seek relationships which will constructively challenge our certainties. In order to connect with people and sources who don’t think like us, we need to be open minded and willing to adapt our thinking. This habit is less comfortable than a natural gravitation to familiar communities. The value of cognitive diversity on boards is well publicised. Encouraging a wide range of voices to inform our thinking and decision making has been a feature of high- performance boards and individual directors.
Benefits:
Continuous surprise. When we travel hopefully and take alternative paths to inform our thinking and decisions, we avoid boredom and dated or obsolete thinking.
Ability to contribute valuable insights. With currency comes amplification of our voice and invitations to share insights with others.
Network of sources and relationships. Collaborating and working in partnership to scan an increasingly complex world, builds trust and a wider understanding of our context. From tracking what has and is happening, our focus can change to discussing how change may develop in the future.
Where to start:
It is often said that making a habit takes 21 days while ensuring it is embedded takes 90 days. Choosing to develop the three habits mentioned above will also involve deciding what we are going to stop doing. A conversation with our coach, mentor or sounding board is a useful first step.
In these challenging times, choosing to lead an organisation requires Situational Intelligence – knowing yourself well and understanding the context in which you operate. The following thoughts and questions are based on our Situational Intelligence methodology, co-created with Dr Laurence Lyons. They are informed by applying that thinking when coaching in the c suite and facilitating board development.
A director’s perspective
Sitting on a board is a responsibility and a privilege. People expect much of the individuals who lead organisations whether in the public, private or third sector. Scrutiny is continuous. Personal reputations are precious. They take time to build and can easily be lost.
The roles of directors and trustees should not to be undertaken lightly. It is wise to carefully pick the boards you join and ensure that you are properly supported in order to effectively fulfil your duties and obligations.
Whether you are a director of a large, listed entity in a regulated sector, a trustee of a charity, a director of a hospital or the founder of a small business, you are responsible and your liability can be unlimited. Look down the road and you will see more regulation and legislation coming.
There are no universal solutions, so understanding your context matters and informs the strategic choices you make. It is also important to recognise that as a member of a board, your beliefs, decisions and behaviour have a significant impact on the value you contribute to the organisations you lead.
Dr Laurence Lyons and I started working together in the early 1990s at the launch of The Henley Future Work Forum. We combined our experience of supporting boards and directors to highlight a different way of thinking, more relevant for the complex and changing business environments in which we operate. The result is our Situational Intelligence methodology, a pragmatic approach to making sense of our complex and volatile world.
Situational Intelligence is based on understanding the strategic context in which you operate, what your organisation is here to do, what it believes is good and right, what it wants to achieve and what priorities it has set. Defining your situation – your objectives and the people you need to engage with. Understanding what motivates each individual in that specific situation. Recognising your own strengths, potential and reputation. Once you have developed those insights, you are in a position to choose the approach which will create a motivated community of people prepared to enable you to achieve your objectives.
Responding to the headhunter – due diligence questions
Q1 Exactly what role is being offered?
Will the position provide me with the power to influence/decide/act?
What responsibilities and accountabilities are involved?
Therefore, what is the level of risk/liability and how does that fit with my own risk appetite?
What am I expected to give and what return will I get? What are the costs and benefits in tangible and intangible terms.
What value could I bring? Why me?
Q2Would the right people be there with me?
Does everyone know what we are here to do – the purpose?
Does everyone know what board capability we need to deliver that purpose?
What value does each individual contribute?
Where are the board capability gaps? How could I fill them?
What is the boardroom culture – collaborative:challenging?
Q3 Are we clear about the way we will operate?
What governance framework would enable me to provide the expected value?
Where is the focus of the board’s attention – strategic:operational?
How diverse are the voices and insights offered and heard in the boardroom?
What opportunity exists to empower others to lead?
Stepping forward takes courage. Awareness of your own strengths, style and reputation/ brand can increase your confidence. Your success is often based on your ability to contribute and orchestrate the contributions of others.
Curiosity helps you create and recognise opportunities, particularly those that are counter-intuitive. Preparing for those opportunities involves reflecting on the past, learning in the present and positioning yourself for the future.
The importance of developing a support network cannot be overstated. Ensuring you have a sounding board will enable you to engage in safe but challenging conversations. Expectations can be high that you will always have the answer. Your network is powerful when it included diversity of thinking and exposes you to a wide range of ideas.
It is always flattering to be approached but choosing wisely is essential for success.
After asking thousands of directors and their governance advisors to define what they mean by ‘Good’ business, the themes over several decades have largely remained the same though the language and emphasis changes.
‘We admire organisations with a clear sense of purpose. They must also tell a compelling story about what they believe in and where they are heading.’
‘Good’ businesses are well led by boards able to challenge and arrive at cohesive decisions. They invite contributions from a variety of stakeholders, to inform their choices.’
‘The best board decision-making is informed by an understanding of the organisation’s capability and capacity, together with the environment in which it operates. Risks are assessed against appetite, beliefs and the requirement to be agile in a changing world.’
‘The golden thread between beliefs, decisions and actions is transparent.’
This apparently simple agenda is difficult to formulate, implement and sustain. In 2023, the debate focuses on ethics, sustainability, ESG and EDI. These themes have pre-occupied boards for decades, though their mnemonics change.
Multiple initiatives exist to identify, promote, audit and enforce ‘Good’ practice. Some are regulatory and some are advisory. For example:
The UK FRC Stewardship Code principles provide a clear framework to require asset owners, managers and advisors to enable investors to make informed choices.
The IFRS International Sustainability Standards Board recently published their reporting standards IFRS 1 and IFRS 2. They have been designed to enable organisations to evidence both their company performance and their commitment to driving sustainable value creation. The results should enable better informed investor choices.
Since 2006, the B Corp movement has been certifying organisations globally and sharing ‘Good’. Their JEDI framework is one of a number of tools designed to enable business to be a force for ‘Good.’
However, despite the publications of standards, regulations and best practice sharing, adoption is slow. PwC publication Strategy + Business July 2023 highlights the gap between sustainability agendas and their delivery. 81% of investors will tolerate a small decrease (1% point or less) in profitability in exchange for ESG action.
Organisations position their beliefs and direction and we, as investors, may choose portfolios with good business credentials but be unwilling to forego returns in the short term. As customers of those same organisations, we may be attracted to those whose philosophy matches our own. The critical question is whether we are prepared to modify our expectations of the products and services they provide in order to support their investment in long term sustainability.
And as I publish this post, today’s mail from McKinsey asks ‘How to create a more sustainable, inclusive and growing future.’
Something to reflect on while watching the tide roll in. And for the curious, sadly I haven’t found any amber yet but I did see the sun rise.
This is the moment to thank the many individuals who collaborated and contributed to the Governance Leadership Programme (GLP) over the past twelve years. With publication of the Governance Hot 100 2023 it is wonderful to once again see Alumni among the nominees and winners.
Back in 2010, prompted by enquiries from my clients, I approached the Joint Managing Directors of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators’ (ICSA’s) commercial business. We discussed the need for The Institute to provide non-technical personal development for senior, experienced professionals. The GLP was co-designed to enable individuals to develop Situational Intelligence™. Participants were provided with opportunities to reflect on how they thought, decided and behaved in the situations they faced. Providing facilitated conversations in trusted groups and peer and professional coaching, the programme reached a global alumni of governance professionals drawn from CGIUKI and Europe, Africa, Asia, North and South America. With a focus on currency and practicality, GLP encouraged hundreds of individuals to be curious and brave.
Among the many inspiring colleagues, speakers and hosts who shared their own stories and insights, special mention goes to:
Will Booth who co-designed the programme and bought so many people together in this valuable collaboration.
Simon Osborne who was an active and enthusiastic sponsor and advocate.
In conversations with Chairs and CEOs from across the private, public and third sectors, a number of clear themes are emerging on HOW TO create and sustain effective Board dynamics in tough times. The insights fall into three key areas:
Develop effective connections:
Meet Directors on a 1:1 basis between formal events to build relationships based on a real understanding of each individual’s strengths and ability to contribute to Board discussions.
Identify how each Director operates, the way they prefer to engage and the format in which they can digest information to inform their decision making.
Check out assumptions to make sure they are well founded. Don’t fall into the trap of ascribing views to individuals based on your own perceptions.
Create continuous dialogue:
Tell the whole story to everyone, not partial stories to different audiences. They are all instantly connected and will know.
Tell the truth. It builds confidence and trust, which will create resilience in tough times.
Listen to insights and challenges, particularly from stakeholders who hold different views.
Build understanding of context:
Focus the Board on strategic discussions and avoid tactical game playing, however satisfying for individual egos.
Develop the big picture but ensure that operational reality checks also occur.
Ensure that there is collective understanding of risk appetite and that it informs your discussions.
Cutting Through the Grey 