This newsletter’s Table of Contents is as follows:
- COVID-19: Clean up your WEB CAM Presence for Board/Committee meetings – 6 tips
- Covid-19 crisis shows Boards that ESG sensitivity and reporting REALLY matter
- A Bad Reputation Is a Governance Risk
- Cybersecurity Gets More Attention
1.COVID-19: Clean up your WEB CAM Presence for Board/Committee meetings – 6 tips
These 6 tips for conducting Board business through video will help your interactions in the virtual world come across as more professional and sophisticated.
1. Compose your picture. Think about the background and composition. Level your face with the camera so people aren’t looking up at you. Be sure you have created an organized, professional background – versus your “headboard”.
2. Check your lighting. You want even, well-defined lighting across your face so your colleagues can see you clearly.
3. Grooming and presentation are critical. Do a close shave, fix your hair/ makeup, and dress professionally. How you are dressed impacts how you think and feel. Don’t put yourself at a cognitive disadvantage because your brain is in “Sunday hang out in pajamas” mode.
4. Check your tech. Be sure you have a high-quality camera and microphone and, if at all possible, use a laptop or computer rather than a smartphone. (GREAT ONES are available for $40!) And test whatever platform you are using ahead of time.
5. Get rid of extraneous noises. Place all your devices on silent. Don’t rustle papers on your desk or tap your pen. If at all possible, conduct your meetings in a private space away from the dogs and kiddos.
6. Look engaged. The way to look engaged is to actually be engaged. Look directly into the webcam when you’re speaking or listening to someone. Genuinely connect with your board members. They will know if you are distracted or trying to discreetly check your email or read a text on your phone.
Source: Corporate Board Member
2.Covid-19 crisis shows Boards that ESG Sensitivity and reporting REALLY matter
The Covid-19 crisis is supporting the thesis that ESG contributes to a positive return on investment and that high ESG performers are being rewarded. While some ESG factors such as cost reductions from implementing energy efficiency initiatives can be quantified, many ESG factors are non-financial and long term in nature and inherently difficult to measure. Nevertheless, the evidence is increasingly showing that higher-rated ESG companies are performing better than lower-rated ones. In fact “ESG investing” continued to grow during the first half of 2020, despite the extreme market volatility during that period.
In addition, during the onset of the pandemic, companies with the highest ESG ratings in every sector, outperformed the broader market index. Between February and May 2020, ESG stocks had fully recovered their losses by the end of April. Companies quick to adapt to this new normal in ESG communication will benefit from better engagement with investors and a more sustainable future.
3. A Bad Reputation Is a Governance Risk
Stakeholder disappointment and anger over a succession of failures by companies to anticipate, mitigate and respond to the impacts of reputational crises — including COVID-19, social justice issues, privacy breaches, sexual harassment and abuse in the workplace — have propelled a tsunami of derivative reputational lawsuits into corporate boardrooms. Therefore, Enterprise risk management needs an overhaul urgently. Board members are right to be concerned; they personally have a lot at stake.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers are seeing a new array of potential opportunities to spotlight boards’ mishandling of reputation and breaches of their duty of loyalty. In addition, board members are being targeted in the court of public opinion with social and mainstream media thrashings (e.g., Wells Fargo, Boeing, PG&E, Equifax, Weinstein Company and Perdue Pharmaceuticals.)
If they are going to be in the crosshairs for reputational crises, board members should take control of the reputation risk oversight process. As a first step, they need to see Reputational risk as a strategic risk which needs MORE PROMINENCE in ‘risk registers’ and identifying who the owners of this risk are. They may even want to consider creating a new integrated reputation governance (IRG) committee whose sole job would be to ask: What issue or event could put our firm so at odds with our stakeholders that our existence would be threatened? Having a robust IRG makes for a good story. And “Reputation insurance” is the executive summary of that good story.
Source: Directors & Boards
4. Cybersecurity Gets More Attention
The EY Center for Board Matters reviewed proxy statements and Form 10-K filings of Fortune 100 companies for emerging trends and developments. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic and intensified cybersecurity risk, findings from the report highlight the increased transparency around that risk’s oversight:
89% of Fortune 100 companies disclosed cybersecurity as a risk, up from 79% in 2018.
87% of companies this year have charged at least one board-level committee with cybersecurity oversight, up from 82% last year and 74% in 2018.
58% of companies included cybersecurity as an area of expertise sought on the board or cited in a director biography, up from 51% last year and 39% in 2018.
While the percentage of companies disclosing that they performed cyber‑incident simulations or tabletop exercises more than doubled from 3% last year to 7% in 2020, the number of companies making this disclosure remains low.
Source: EY
