Boards That Deliver: Advancing Corporate Governance From Compliance to Competitive Advantage

Chapter Four

Information Architecture

Good group dynamics are not much use when directors lack information for a productive discussion. The bottom line: Boards need the right information in the right format at the right time.

Unfortunately, Liberated boards often find the quantity, substance, or format of information they receive to be inadequate. Worse, directors on the same board often have different views on what information is desirable—some want more; some want less. What they can agree on is that the information often falls short in helping them build any insights into the business.

Whether it’s spreadsheets of raw accounting data, reports filled with company jargon, thick books of information sent too close to the board meeting to be ...