The Visionary Board’s Imperative:
Ensuring Alignment Between Human Capital, Cultural and Strategic Initiatives
Company success relies on both a robust business strategy and a strong, talented team to deliver it. What is the Board’s responsibility for leadership development? If business strategy defines what a company plans to do, then leadership strategy governs how a company will do it. Shouldn’t an active board be equally concerned with both?
In May, WCD and Pearl Meyer released a new Thought Leadership Commission report entitled, The Visionary Board at Work: Developing a Culture of Leadership, a copy of which is attached. As part of this report, a global survey conducted by WCD and Pearl Meyer found that roughly 90% of respondents believe that Boards have a responsibility to oversee talent and leadership strategy, but only 11% of boards thought they were doing this well. This finding was consistent across US and multinational companies. While the board’s role for CEO succession is clear, leadership strategy goes much deeper. More than the mere identification of a collective group of current and future executives, it is the development and stewardship of a company’s priorities and values – that is, its culture. The report concludes there is a general consensus that best practices in this area are still evolving.
Our experienced panel of directors will talk about how to take leadership development to the next level and provide some examples of how this more proactive role for the board has occurred in their companies. We will then break for dinner with table questions focusing on how each of you addresses these challenges in your own boards.
Our panelists are:
Tracy Atkinson is executive vice president and chief compliance officer (CCO) of State Street Corporation. Tracy has held many leadership positions in Finance and Compliance at State Street, including oversight of Treasury, Investor Relations, business unit finance and Enterprise Decision Support. Prior to joining State Street in 2008, Tracy was a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers for 16 years before joining MFS Investment Management. At MFS, Tracy was SVP, Chief Risk & New Product Development Officer and later Treasurer & CFO of MFS’ mutual fund complex. Tracy has been an independent Director at Raytheon Corporation since 2014 and is currently chairman of the audit committee. Tracy is also president of the board of The Arc of Massachusetts. She is a Certified Public Accountant.
Elaine Eisenman currently serves as a director for DSW, Inc (NYSE), Miravan, and ATmosXR, and is the Managing Director of Saeje Advisors, an advisory company for high growth ventures. At DSW she is a member of the compensation and nominating committees, and chairs the annual strategy review, also having served on the CEO selection committee. Until recently, she served on Board of Harvard Vanguard Health Associates, a $1.5 Billion non-profit health care organization. Elaine is also on the Advisory Board of Qwalify, a Canadian start-up. She has served on the boards of several private companies, including Active International, HRLogic, and several family and early stage businesses. She is a founding member, chapter co-chair, and member of the Advisory Board of Women Corporate Directors Foundation. Most recently, Elaine served as Dean of Executive and Enterprise Education at Babson College, and Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership. Prior to her role at Babson, Elaine’ s career includes experience as a business leader and general manager, HR executive, and organizational consultant. Her key areas of expertise include executive selection, transition, CEO succession, and the alignment of strategy, selection, compensation, and performance during periods of growth, mergers, and transformation.
Melissa Means is a Managing Director with Pearl Meyer with over 20 years of experience in executive and board compensation. She assists clients in designing, implementing and communicating incentive plans and total compensation strategies, pay for performance alignment and shareholder outreach. Melissa works closely with Boards and management teams in addressing governance practices, executive transitions/succession planning and aligning pay with business strategies. As a part of regularly being in the Boardroom, Melissa also provides context to Boards on group behavioral dynamics and interactions among the Board and with management. She is a member of Women Corporate Directors and the National Association of Corporate Directors (New England and National), where she also served on the Program Committee. She was co-author of the WCD Thought Leadership Reports in 2014 and 2017. She is a member of The Boston Club, served on the Corporate Board Committee and chaired the Corporate Advisory Board Committee.
Bennie Wiley is Principal of The Wiley Group. For fifteen years, she served as the President and CEO of The Partnership, Inc., where she built an organization that strengthened Boston's capacity to attract, retain and develop talented professionals of color. She is a frequent speaker on leadership, diversity and professional development. Bennie is a Director of Dreyfus Mutual Funds, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and CBIZ (NYSE: CBZ) where she is on the compensation committee. She has served as Chair of PepsiCo’s African American Advisory Board, and formerly served on the board of First Albany Companies (NASDAQ: FACT). Her current civic boards include Dress for Success Boston, Partners Continuing Care, the Black Philanthropy Fund, The Efficacy Institute and Howard University where she serves as Vice Chair.
We look forward to seeing you October 23, 2017.
Elaine Eisenman, Renee Knilans, Pam Lenehan, Mary Ann Tocio
RSVP to Pam Lenehan:
[email protected] or 781-449-9665