Governance in the Digital Age

Introduction

What Does It Mean to Govern in the Digital Age?

Corporate governance has always been a challenging job, but there has likely never been a time when serving on a board has been more challenging and demanding than right now. Board oversight is charged with more risk than ever before, with directors having to confront a wide array of increasingly complex pressures from both inside and outside the company: an unpredictable geopolitical, environmental, economic, and social climate; workplace misconduct allegations against senior executives; public and regulatory outcry against companies that haven’t adequately protected consumer data; activist shareholders working to replace or augment board directors with new and more diverse talent – the list goes on. Regardless of this complexity, directors are expected to be able to respond instantly to any situation that comes their way, with little tolerance from stakeholders for anything other than swift and positive outcomes. Directors are judged on their speed of action and their ability to accurately predict what is going to happen in an environment defined by unpredictability.

Meanwhile, the procedures and norms of board meetings have not changed since parliamentary procedure was codified in the late nineteenth century in Robert’s Rules of Order, which encouraged careful deliberation of issues before making final decisions. Such a deliberate pace of decision making is not likely to be valued in an era best defined by Moore’s ...