The Importance of Timing

Read how NACD's president and CEO distinguishes between time-bound and year-round planning for boards.

Boards do not operate entirely in linear time. Their work must incorporate the unpredictable, the uncertain, and the long term. The classic distinction between chronos, orchronological time, and kairos,orthe opportune time, comes to mind.

NACD strives to maintain a good sense of timing in our member offerings. Fall, for example, is a season of planning and preparation for many boards.

Accordingly, since its earliest days, with very few exceptions, NACD has held its annual conference, now called the NACD Directors Summit^™, in October. After nearly half a century of experience, we have found that this timing is ideal for most board members.

For companies that follow the calendar year for their financial reports—as most public companies do—fall is the final quarter of the year and thus the right time to begin assessing the current year’s achievements and planning for the next. And since many public companies hold annual shareholder meetings in the spring, fall is when boards begin to prepare for that important event.

Yet between chronos and kairos, the latter may be even more important.

As boards concern themselves with closing last year’s books and planning next year’s meetings, they must ask profound questions that may not be tied to calendars: What does artificial intelligence portend for our company’s core business and the board itself? How will major policy shifts affect our supply chain? How are we preparing our next generation of company leaders? How will we identify and promote or recruit leaders who look forward? Are we due for a reinvention of our business model, and if so, what shall we become?

This is the kind of mindset addressed in these pages; it is the mindset we need year-round. ■

Peter R. Gleason
President and CEO of NACD

This article is from the fall 2025 issue of Directorship.