Crisis, what crisis? Our take on how boards should not just respond to, but learn from, a crisis. Deeply embedded in the Corona Virus pandemic, we look at what tools and models will benefit Directors in a crisis; from one’s own mental models to leadership and decision-making frameworks. Andrew explains the Cynefin Framework and how context can and should be the driver of decision making processes during difficult times. Dale takes us into how boards and companies can prosper on the back of crisis by embracing innovation as it ties to purpose. Directors need to engage with emergent practice within the context of their company’s purpose and learn from it. So is your crisis a gift? How will you approach it? If these are the moments that make humanity, what will your impact as a Director be on our future world? It’s coming fast.

Our first guest, Neelesh Mehta, talks to us about compassion in the boardroom. Neelesh helps us build insights into our attitude towards ourself, and how this impacts the way we interact with others and therefore our performance in the boardroom. It always starts with self – you can’t give what you don’t have. So how can you elevate love and respect for yourself to compassion for others in order to be your best self, your best Director. If you’re not bringing yourself to the table, who are you bringing? The Agile Director mantra: know your purpose when you come into the Boardroom, know yourself. Can one hold a different perspective, but also contribute to another’s perspective? Isn’t this how Boards add value? What’s your definition of #winning and how do you contribute to an environment that values everyone’s input and genuinely has a common goal? Is the meditative Board the way forward? The remarkable response to commencing Board Meetings with collective silence, bringing everyone to the same frequency. Collectively working towards a common goal is a form of meditation….so why not? Trying our best to bring our self-compassion to the boardroom is essential. How do we bring it to others? As the wise have said, you don’t need to engender self compassion, you just need to re-discover it. Chill out…tune in…join the conversation now

Do you know your company ecosystem? This week we get into the genetics of your company, examining the system of connections that gives you permission to operate. We ask whether your board has a social contract with its stakeholders? What is your true connection with community, staff and the wider company ecosystem, and should that be subject to obligation like a contract? We’ll argue that boards need to have this conversation because your ecosystem doesn’t just connect to your business model, it drives and sustains it. Shareholders, investors, staff, regulators, and your community want to see real accountability. We’re seeing signals that now is the right time to surface this. As the weighting of value is changing, how do you place yourself at the front of the curve? How do you start this conversation as a leader, a Director? Purpose; if you know your why you are free to participate in more whats! We’ve got an idea about how to start this fire….and we want to get your feedback fuel.

Does your organisation have a right to exist? What is its contract with society, with its community, with its staff? A longer episode than usual, covering the confluence of COVID and the economic and regulatory crisis and how your board could look differently at your value proposition. We look at: - Corporations Law - The purpose of human life and company structures - The corporate ecosystem - CSR and the re-emergence of kindness - Where real value sits in your company Do we need to be more prescriptive of the definition of a Director’s duty to the company? Can we move from not just not doing harm, but into doing good? The ever-increasing divide between commercial activity and humanity makes us question - how do we govern beyond what’s physical, to the emotional, the social? The Board itself can be the guardian of purpose – Directors can be our proxy representatives – but how do they gather the wide-ranging views of their communities, stakeholders and keep their eyes and minds wide open? Is now the time to return to The Forum? Can we trust in the wisdom of crowds and capture a national conversation – indeed are we compelled to have the conversation about our human purpose, to have an existential position on why we exist. CSC is such a big community conversation. We consider how each company could negotiate their social contract with: - Employees - Supply chain - Partners - Investors - Regulators Can you focus on what you promise *not* to do? So you can properly consider what promises you are making. This could hold your performance conversation in a totally different light across the whole corporate ecosystem. Could we start from value? And what structures do we need to support a purposeful intent? What do we as Directors need to be conscious of to achieve this? Is there 1 stakeholder in your ecosystem that you could have a starting conversation with? Join the conversation now

We’re raising questions about how corporations own labour – and looking at how our working arrangements could and should change. Is COVID-19 handing us an opportunity to work in a completely different way; to not just transform businesses but to re-shape the knowledge economy? Dale, Andrew and Kristin ride the tide of technological liberation, rethinking the entitlement to economic value that comes from employee contribution. We look at different ways of sharing – cooperative, consulting – and shared ownership of IP/ideas. We ask, what are the new corporate structures that can share more of the pie. Platform cooperatives for example – groups of workers who band together. Technology and generational change are driving change, changing expectations, changing structures, changing resourcing. Locally and globally platform cooperatives have emerged as mechanisms to combine cooperation with technology. Cooperatives allow people to focus on what they are good at and enjoy….so we’re more productive. And how significant is this change we are currently in? Does the crisis accelerate change or create it? And collectively do we have the right mindset to make change to our corporate structures and our working agreements? What are we doing better and cheaper, and what can we build into our new business model? So, who will revert to type when COVID is done, and who will be shown to be more productive, more creative, more kind in the new world? Directors need to think deeply about whether this time is transformational – is their business model resilient? Is it fair? Why wouldn’t we try to entrench the return, so all boats rise as the tides come in? What would the Agile Director do? Join the conversation now.

Andrew Donovan and Dale Simpson reflect on the true competitive advantage that can be drawn from the COVID experience. We learn there’s more to risk management than having a policy; that having a crisis plan will never beat having great and engaged people. It turns out it’s not about prediction at all, it’s about people. In COVID we have seen kindness come to the fore. Executives are discovering that check ins are the order of the day – becoming focussed on their people and gathering more and better data from it. People are being heard and having a space to speak. Yes, organisations that have pivoted quickly are doing better. But really good Boards are shifting their business to entirely new ways of working that are driven by people as purpose. So what will be sustained from this time; connection, compassion at the board table? In this focussed next phase, how do we harness the moment between this intense experience and moving to the new normal. How do we really learn to think about what the new normal should be, not just what’s happening next. And could this be Director enlightenment? Hear how Directors start these conversations with their Board? To make sure we learn the lessons COVID has to offer us, and learn the right lessons at that. Plus a lot of love for the introverts among us. Tune in.