79. Do You Need a Governance Consultant?

Every board can improve, but should you hire a governance consultant to help?  What do governance consultants even do in the first place?  How do you know if you‘re getting good advice? SCRIPT: Does any person or organization ever really *need* a consultant of any variety? Except in cases where external verification or validation is mandated, the answer is usually going to be “no.” I mean think about it, on the spectrum of literally saving lives to setting your money on fire a corporate governance consultant is an opulent luxury. With that admission out of the way, I think that I – and people like me – can cause a lot of lightbulbs to go off over people’s heads, regardless of what boardroom we might be working in. Perhaps a better question is: “how do you know if you’re getting good governance advice?” If you’re a fan of this podcast you already know that my position is there’s no “best” practice when it comes to corporate governance, so you’re relying on your consultant to lead you to the practices that are right for your board and executive team and help empower you to evolve your governance as your organization grows, changes, and matures. The most common red flag, in my experience, is any governance consultant who gives you an unmitigated “A+” and leaves. Not only is no board perfect, but who needs to waste their time and money on a process that essentially tells you to do nothing? A different way to put it is make sure your governance advisor leaves you with new intelligence, tools, and/or recommendations that cause you to do something better tomorrow than what you did yesterday. Framed that way, couldn’t we all use a bit of governance advice?