Board Oversight in Building a Resilient Corporate Culture

In the corporate context, culture has been described as “the sum of the shared assumptions, values, and beliefs that create the unique character of an organization.” While it is often perceived as a “soft issue,” it is actually a hard issue - both in the sense of having concrete impact, and in the sense of being difficult to assess.

Directors have a responsibility to bring more rigor to the discussion about organizational culture. Directors bring a unique perspective to the table - often informed by years of executive and board experience with a range of companies and industries, and may be better able to pick up on early warning signs than those with solely an insider’s point of view. Organizational culture has been studied by business and academic writers for decades, but it tends to attract public attention mainly in the wake of negative events, such as the accounting scandals of 2001 and 2002, the 2008 banking and financial crash, and the series of corporate crises that unfolded in 2016 and 2017. But a company’s culture has the potential to enable positive results as well. As one group of analysts observed: “If culture is left to chance, it can absorb precious energy and put the handbrake on the organization achieving its purpose and strategic goals. But if led and managed well, culture is the rocket fuel for delivering value to stakeholders”  (excerpt from the NACD Blue Ribbon Commission report on Culture).

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Moderator

Barbara Duganier, NACD.DC

Director, Arcadis, NV; McDermott International; MRC Global; Pattern Energy; Texas Pacific Land Corporation

Barbara Duganier has a collaborative and engaging communication style, reflected during several chapters in her 44-year career: 23 years at Arthur Andersen as an auditor and consultant, where she served in multiple leadership positions, including as the chief financial officer for Andersen Worldwide; 10 years as a consulting partner...

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