Live Board Simulation: Withstanding A Crisis Through Management Dynamics

For many board directors and senior executives, experiencing a company crisis has become a modern-day rite of passage. By now, everyone is aware that crises pose a constant threat to all organisations, regardless of how efficiently they appear to be managed. Crises can appear out of thin air, grow in intensity over the course of hours or even minutes, and endanger the continued existence of an organisation. They might also appear when long-simmering problems get out of hand. Institutions have paid the price in the form of significant regulatory penalties or court judgments, damaged reputations, diminished trust, and collapsed share prices.​

Yet how many businesses can actually claim to be ready for a catastrophe of this magnitude? How much of the work of crisis preparedness fully considers interactions within the board and between the boardroom and the executive suite? How might the risk of deteriorating organisational dynamics be best identified and addressed—ideally, before a crisis?​

Looking beyond the contents of conventional crisis playbooks, this Board Simulation will stage some of the most sensitive fault lines that a crisis rapidly exposes to devastating effect. Drawing in-depth act in the boardroom with battletested board directors and senior executives who have experience serving on boards of or as senior executives through an actual event and case study in a “live” role play, the facilitator and assessors will provide deep insights and perspective on how boards and senior executives can equip themselves to make decisions, respond to external scrutiny and develop solutions under the most intense pressure. ​

From common scenarios such as overreliance of the board on management, or on the flip side, micromanagement of the board – to problematic and challenging dynamics within the board itself, the session will examine some of the do’s and don’ts of boardroom dynamics and how creative abrasion can bring together different personalities and profiles towards fostering positive outcomes and greater effectiveness.

Learning Outcomes

• Hands-on learning of Board Dynamics:
  • Individual personalities
  • Group dynamics
  • Group think/challenge/debate/conflict.
• Observing others in action, vs, putting yourself in their shoes. This provides simultaneous learning and self-reflection.