A good lineup of board members can be really helpful to your company – if you put together the right group of people. Here’ what you should look for:
• Expertise in the area your company operates in – people with the full 360 because they’ve been there. People who know how to deal with both opportunities and obstacles that will come up…and how to help you prepare your company for the future.
• Contacts and resources that can help your company – people, either professional or venture, who can pick up the phone and connect you.
• Blunt honesty when it’s needed (tempered with respect) — people who can encourage your company to look at the elephant in the room issues. Whether it’s succession in a family-owned business, or an off-skewed exit tactic that can backfire, or your performance as a manager, they will bring it up for examination.
We helped one of our clients develop a highly supportive board: Because it is a medical device, software as service (SaaS) company, we helped them bring in an advisor from big pharma with channel distribution expertise in the medical area. This expert wasn’t needed for about a year but we wanted him to be on board early. We also brought in two world-class experts who had put together a number of companies and brought them to market — one in medical devices and one in software and hardware. And we capped it off with an accountant with CFO experience to guide us once we started our growth spurt. This spread of solid expertise was there to guide the company and ask the right questions in its formative stages.
Next blog – Part 2: How many advisors? How do you attract them? Who to avoid? Compensation.
Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.