In today’s rapidly evolving business environment, boards can no longer rely simply on expertise and experience as key drivers of performance.

The only way to effectively stay ahead of the competition is by having directors who possess a deep, and dynamic self-awareness.

When boards can cultivate an honest understanding of their unique strengths, blind spots, and internal dynamics, they unlock the potential to make faster, smarter decisions.

Accelerating board performance is never about strategic insight alone. It also involves a crucial alignment of purpose with behaviours and reflection. In the face of constant disruption, greater self-awareness is not only beneficial—it is essential for survival.

A shift from process to behavioural leadership

Traditionally, boards have been primarily process-driven, adopting a more autocratic approach that enables leaders to exercise their influence through control and power.

More recently, leadership styles have begun shifting towards a behavioural-driven style which embraces democratic principles, encouraging participation and collaboration among group members.

This indicates a growing emphasis on reflection, inclusivity and shared decision-making on matters of governance and strategy.

The Cognadi study of 200 UK board directors uncovered four types of boards:

• Foundation. Boards that satisfy basic governance requirements—structurally sound with a strong focus on today and are predominately procedural.
• Operational. Board skills and experience match the organisation’s medium to long-term goals, with clear objectives, strong operating processes and a behavioural orientation.
• Strategic. Boards have high IQ and emotional quotient characteristics, drawing on skills and experience to provide diversity of thinking, cultural sensitivity and offer partnership, equal balance process and behavioural sensitivity.
• Dynamic. Boards that act as high-performing stewards, and who are curious, reflective and focused on supportive and reflective behavioural orientation.

This study also found that around 44% of the participants did not rate their boards as behaviourally focused. In addition, 20% were uncertain whether they were predominantly process (foundation/operational), or behaviourally oriented (strategic/dynamic).

This ‘uncertainty’ highlights a challenge in transitioning from an operational to a strategic thinking board, where the focus is more on the dynamics of human interactions and behaviours.

Board directors may find it challenging to recognise and improve their meta-cognitive capabilities of how to align differing perspectives. Such requires a deep level of self-awareness and reflection, which could be hindered by cognitive biases and ingrained thought patterns.

Smart enough to spot their own limitations?

While board directors are often smart and successful people, they may still be unaware of their limitations in thinking or overconfident in their expertise. This makes it challenging to critically evaluate their own decision processes.

It’s understandable that the fast-paced, high-stakes nature of boardroom environments leaves little room for the introspection required to develop meta-cognitive skills. Immediate results and actions tend to take priority over reflective practices.

The decision to foster greater self-awareness is a pivotal step for boards which aspire to become dynamic.

The starting point is a critical evaluation of cognitive biases and decision-making processes that require a forward-looking mindset where board members actively facilitate adapting strategy to meet changing business needs.

Dynamic boards exhibit a reflective capacity that sharpens problem-solving and innovation, while also promoting a culture of continuous learning and adaptability.

Moving to a more participative leadership style does not happen overnight. The steps boards can actively take to help them on this journey necessitate working through four separate stages: enhancing board self-awareness; supporting the decision process, encouraging a diverse board, and developing dynamic behaviour.

1  The journey to board self-awareness

Developing greater board-level self-awareness requires the chair to shape the mindsets of the board, and their own. Designing a framework for assessing board performance that balances quantitative behavioural data with intuition and experience delivers a culture of ever-evolving self-awareness.

At this point, a deeper understanding of the board’s collective mental inclination towards mitigating risk and driving higher-quality decisions start seeping through.

What cannot be discarded is to ensure that the board is composed of the right people who can embrace collaboration and are change ready.

2  Supporting the decision-making process

Facilitating participative outcomes demands a collaborative culture and well-designed information architecture. Participants should be provided with timely and relevant information from key sources, which helps inform them and accelerate decision-making processes. These sources include:

• An effective company secretary. Sometimes referred to as ‘invisible leaders’, company secretaries have a pivotal role in exercising influence by ensuring compliance, coordinating and facilitating meetings, fostering openness and transparency, and effectively communicating with relevant stakeholders. In the Cognadi survey, 79.1% of board directors considered their company secretary to be commercially orientated, providing appropriate support to the board and its committees.

• Committees—audit, nomination, remuneration. Committees help the board achieve its objectives by providing more in-depth scrutiny of the issues it faces. In the Cognadi study, 81% believed that key committees facilitate the work of the board.

• The board decision process. Recognising bias awareness and decision-making improvement are both becoming increasingly necessary. There is a high correlation between decision effectiveness and financial results. Organisations featuring directors with developed cognitive awareness and decision processes outperform other entities.

• Regular board assessment. Evidence on the quality of interpersonal dynamics, decision-making effectiveness, and self-awareness is increasingly expected by stakeholders, internal staff and management. This requires evidence of the ‘you can only manage it if you can measure it’ type.

• An effective C-suite. The CEO is key to providing the link between the board and the C-suite. With a positive interface between the CEO and chair, the board can help guide the C-suite towards shaping the organisation’s strategic approach.

3  Encouraging a diverse board

Having the correct blend of a board’s membership emphasises the skills and experience required to help meet the business’s needs in the short-term, and long into the future.

Boards are more likely to foster a collaborative environment by:

• Ensuring ‘diversity of thought’ is well represented and balanced, with a wide set of skills and expertise represented on the board, along with a variety of demographic perspectives, including gender, age and ethnicity). This provides richer discussions and collaborative decision-making, with members being more likely to challenge assumptions and think creatively. The Cognadi study revealed the ‘added value’ that female directors bring, particularly in behavioural function. Males are significantly more weighted in the ‘process’ end of the board continuum.

• Determining ‘cultural fit’ in the recruitment of new board members significantly enhances collaboration through shared or aligned values and goals. This leads to improved decision-making and builds trust and respect among members, leading to improved engagement and reduced conflict.

• Identifying potential skills gaps through the creation of a detailed board skills matrix. This means roles and responsibilities are clarified, diversity of thought is encouraged, strategic discussions are more readily facilitated, and succession plans are in place to maintain continuity and stability.

• Monitoring board member contribution. Board directors are often faced with an overload of information. Drawing on any support tool or board diagnostic needs to be quick, efficient and portable, if groupthink and other biases are to be minimised.

• Identifying and quantifying the levels of motivation and engagement. Chairs should be able to quantify, qualify and reset levels of motivation and engagement in real-time, all with the goal of maintaining high levels of board performance and unity.

4  Developing dynamic behaviour

The Cognadi study identifies a three-step transition process to facilitate more effective and dynamic behaviour in this respect:

Meta-cognitive reflection as a core process: First, the board needs to develop meta-cognitive capabilities to allow it to navigate the complexities of continually changing environments. Higher functioning self-awareness allows leaders to critically reflect on their own thinking, adapt to rapid changes, and improve decision-making. By fostering an ability to question assumptions and evaluate strategies in real-time, boards can be more agile, resilient and innovative.

Cultural alignment: Next, the board must embrace a culture of openness and active participation, encouraging equal contributions from all of its members, rather than relying on a few dominant voices. Reshaping meeting structures to foster collaboration, and introducing frequent, short sessions requires exceptional leadership from the chair. The chair should also be comfortable balancing intuition and experience, utilising behavioural data about their board so judgements on key issues are robust and defensible.

Performance linked diversity: Third, the board has to diversify its skill set and perspectives, integrating new expertise in innovation, technology and other market trends. This results in a consistent and effective approach to strategy that becomes part of the board’s culture, and encourages continuous review and adaptation of plans.

Nurturing the meta-cognitive

Many boards already conduct annual self-evaluations and key stakeholders are increasingly likely to push for greater public disclosure around the results of evaluations, focusing on how boards are improving their performance, mitigating biases, and fostering improved governance.

Board assessments that explore areas such as interpersonal dynamics, decision-making effectiveness, and self-awareness are likely to become more commonplace and naturally expected by stakeholders, professional bodies and the government.

By aligning meta-cognitive resources with long-term goals and anticipating future challenges, boards can significantly enhance their ability to help their organisations create sustainable competitive advantage.

This approach calls for a reorientation of outdated thought processes, where the bigger picture always takes precedence to enable a proactive, rather than reactive, goal. This will define the role boards play, and detail how they add value to the organisations and societies they serve.

Steve Mullinjer and Andrew Myers are consultants at Cognadi Systems, a leadership assessment organisation. Andrew Kakabadse is professor of leadership and governance at Henley Business School.