I drove up less than half a mile along Kabarsiran Avenue to Kibondeni College, where Lisa Issroff, the CEO of the Issroff Family Foundation, was facilitating her session at the NGO Directors’ workshop jointly hosted by them and the Women On Boards Network.
In the meeting room were seated around 50 bright young men and women from around Africa, some already board members, others aspiring.
Lisa was faciliting them through what it takes to be an effective board member, and next was our panel session, where Caroline Armstrong, Wambui Mbesa and I had been asked to speak along the following lines:
Introduce yourself – Share a brief background on your professional journey.
Introduce your organisation – Provide context on its mission, work, and impact.
How and why did you join the board? – What motivated you to take on this role?
Describe your board experience – Share notable challenges, successes, and key responsibilities.
Your biggest learnings – What insights or advice would you give to current and aspiring board members?
I started by mentioning that I live just down the road from there, and shared two things in common with this Opus Dei Kibondeni College: I am an adjunct faculty member of Strathmore Business School, and in 1961 my wife Evelyn Mungai was the first African student at Kianda Secretarial College – the first multi-racial college in Kenya. And both Strathmore and Kianda are Opus Dei institutions.
I came to Kenya in 1977, I shared, and that is when I joined my first board, having arrived here to be the General Manager of the Kenya subsidiary of British-based multinational ICL, and hence a member of its Kenya board.
A year later the British Business Association of Kenya (now the Kenya Chapter of the British Chamber of Commerce) was formed, and for some reason this very young British expatriate, quite new to Kenya and to Africa, was invited to become its founder chairman.
More chair positions followed, from the Kenya ICT Federation to the Kenya Institute of Management to KCA University to the Rotary Club of Nairobi to Occidental Insurance, plus other directorships, including of Kepsa, The Blue Company, AFIDEP, Davis & Shirtliff and Hotpoint Appliances. In answer to the question of how and why I joined these boards, in each case it was simply because I was invited to.
I was not a domain expert in any of them, and my skills lay largely elsewhere.
The words that describe me are integrator and energy aligner; mediator and consensus builder; mentor and coach – not least in the development of emotional intelligence. I encourage strategic thinking, and indeed two of my directorships came about as a result of me having facilitated the development of the relevant organisations’ strategic plans.
This requires being driven by an uplifting purpose, and so to living the vision and values of the entity, aligned with one’s own.
My default position is to communicate with a light touch, including in moments of crisis. In my directorships and my consulting I expect to be “having a good time doing good things”, with colleagues, clients and others.
I described my years leading IT companies that then led to me to launching my management consulting firm The DEPOT, as a memorial to my late son Dan.
And I referred to my Business Daily column, in which I have written several articles about being an effective board member and leader. Here I have described how I apply my consensus building skills – creating unity among board members and with the CEO and other staff, plus external stakeholders.
The main challenges and learnings I have experienced pretty much relate to why I was selected for the various positions I have occupied over the last nearly 50 years, reinforced by writing about these in my column.
My two fellow panelists told us about what it has been like to rise through the ranks as women. “Don’t allow a chip to develop on your shoulder”; “do it your way”; sometimes doors open that you didn’t knock on – decide if to go through them”; “be adaptable, step forward, and step up”, we heard from Caroline.
And tech entrepreneur Wambui “never felt the gender thing” on boards where she has served, so did not suffer from “imposter syndrome”.
“Be prepared”, she strongly advised, and “follow your passion”.
I was so impressed by the thoughtful and lively participants at this workshop, confident they will return to their workplaces inspired to perform at yet higher levels. As I always say, those who really needed to be in the room may well have been the least likely to be present.
The writer the is chairman of management consultancy The DEPOT, and co-founder of the Institute for Responsible Leadership. [email protected]
