Having spent the last five days learning to think like a company director, I thought I’d share some of the salient points for those IT leaders about to pitch that major investment or 3-year technology plan to your board.
The facilitators at the Company Directors Course made it extremely clear where directors minds are focused when reading board papers and listening to management presentations – Risk, Strategic fit, Financial viability (always with their thoughts on solvency), Legal compliance and overall how the proposal will benefit the company and therefore its owners/shareholders. Importantly, directors have fiduciary duty – a legal obligation to act in good faith with due diligence to the company.
So, next time you are preparing your proposal and board presentation, put yourself in your company director’s shoes and think about:
- How your proposal delivers the defined company objectives and strategy
- How does it affect the balance sheet, the income statement and the company’s cash flow position?
- What can go wrong? – risk considerations and financial sensitivity analysis under different scenarios
- OH&S, Trade practices, environmental, climate change, privacy and Intellectual property considerations – these are ‘hot buttons’ for directors
- Finally, making sure you demonstrate a structured approach to your decision making (6 thinking hats, 5 whys, Decision tree) and the triple bottom line ethics considered.
All this (with a dose of shiny and impressive technology demo) will help convince (and impress) your directors – and deliver a better decision for your company.
