Are you looking for a new independent non-executive director? Or is this the first time you have decided to appoint an independent director for your business?

Whether as part of our ongoing service of guiding your board or as a once off engagement, speak to us about ensuring you appoint great directors.

Appointing a director is relatively easy. Appointing great directors who are going to support you to have a high-performance board is much more difficult. A great appointment process requires a consideration of assessment, service, review and appointment. If this process is conducted effectively, the assessment stage can also provide the ‘due diligence’ any great director is going to want to see and consider.

Using a combination of our methodology, recognized personality profiling and market reach, we will source and appoint great directors for your board.

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What does it take to appoint a high-performance director?

Through understanding an individual’s commercial astuteness, to testing their natural energy (see Contribution Compass) and ensuring their governance knowledge, we make sure the right people are appointed to the team.

To ensure we appoint directors who are going to add value to the company and its shareholders and other stakeholders, we begin the process with a high-performance board assessment. To appoint the right people we must understand why the company wants a board and what the board is going to need to achieve. Where a board already exists we want to know what is working and how this next appointment will increase the value of the board to the company.

Finding the right directors is not an easy process. It is a combination of selecting directors from the group of accredited Sirdar Director and advertising the appointment that enables us to seek out the right individual for the role. Rigorous vetting of candidates, training where required and support during their due diligence of your company is all part of the process.

  • Accredited membership in the Sirdar Governance Panel is not just about serving on SME and privately-held company boards and really making a difference. It’s also about joining a panel of peers who collectively hold an astounding array of skills and experience, supported through the ongoing training and development provided by Sirdar’s methodology and team.

    Belinda Doveston Managing Director of Sirdar Global Operations, Cape Town, South Africa

  • I have seen first-hand how the Sirdar process of structured governance and independent thought can raise the level of discussions at board meetings, translating directly into long-term value for the shareholders.

    Richard Franklin Halls Investments (Pty) Ltd, Johannesburg, South Africa

  • In the context of SMEs in developing nations, the biggest socio-economic imperative is to be successful. Through success and growth you create employment and opportunities for other stakeholders (your suppliers and customers) to grow with you. Every growing business creates spin-off economic activity that drives socio-economic change. Therefore, it is incumbent on every SME shareholder, director and manager to drive the success of their enterprise. Yet, it’s not about driving success at the expense of everything else. It’s about driving success in order to make this positive impact.

    Murray Chabant Sirdar accredited independent chairman, Johannesburg, South Africa

  • As a director it is important to focus on continuous improvement. It enables the company to keep one step ahead in a changing world and ensure it is not left wondering where its market share went. This serves to support the team to realise that if you always do what you have always done, then you will lose your competitive advantage.

    Raewyn Bates Co-founder of Sirdar Global, Sirdar Global financial manager and public sector consultant, New Zealand

  • Governance is a long-term journey and it takes time to become an expert. Using Gladwell’s 10 000 hours concept, it would take at least 1 000 board meetings before you could call yourself an expert. That is 80 years on a monthly board meeting cycle as a director of only one business!

    Stephen Bentz Sirdar accredited independent chairman and winner of two awards at both the 2013 and 2014 Sirdar Annual Governance Awards, Johannesburg, South Africa

The appointment of directors requires careful consideration. On the one hand, shareholder-managers need to select their non-executive directors wearing their shareholder hat and accept the new authority of their board over the business as part of the governance process. On the other hand, shareholder-managers may also have to consider whether all shareholders should also be directors of the company, if they are represented at all. The direct connection between holding shares and the right to board membership is faulty logic believed by SME shareholders who are not schooled in the governance process.

 

Traversing the Avalanche by Carl Bates, Chapter 3

Would you like assistance to appoint a high-performance board or director?

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