Getting the right board on board

Ground Floor: Sometimes I think that life and business would be so much easier if - like in the movie The Matrix - we were all part of some giant computer programme.

Then when things got difficult, we could simply quit the programme and start all over again, erasing our mistakes and beginning with a whole new set of parameters, thus following the apocryphal Irish response when asking directions: "I wouldn't start from here."

I can't help feeling that (along with much else) some of these thoughts were in the mind of the former Minister for Transport when he decided to break up Aer Rianta and replace it with regional airport authorities. It would seem to me, leaving aside the personality issues, that he simply got to the stage of deciding that there were a million things that needed to be done but they simply couldn't be done with the status quo as the starting point. And so he ripped up the former model and decided to start all over again.

Only, of course, it isn't easy to start with a completely new sheet, despite the advertisements over the weekend for a chief executive for the Dublin Airport Authority. You can call something a new name but, unless the structures are changed and the people behind those structures go along with the changes, you're still dragging a ball and chain behind you.

The core issue about Aer Rianta was in deciding whether it was run for the employees or for its customers. Certainly, most news reporting would lead one to believe that the employees of the company felt that its number one priority was ensuring that they had jobs for life and the board of management tended to agree with them.

Which is a somewhat quaint notion in today's cut-throat world. Of course, a job for life is a wonderful idea but only if it's a sustainable job, fulfilling a real function and adding value to the company as a whole and, therefore, not being subsidised by the taxpayer.

Jobs change and evolve as companies change and evolve. In a modern environment, flexibility is a key component of both board members and employees alike. Culturally, however, we have not always been flexible in the area of employment and there are many people who, when joining their company, want to change the terms and conditions so that their job becomes the job they wanted rather than the job they actually got.

Valuing employees is important. Valuing board members is equally important. And getting the right people in the right places is the most important of all.

In appointing a new chief executive to Dublin and setting up a new board, it might be instructive for the new Minister to take some advice from our friends at Forbes, who have guidelines for selection board appointees.

The first priority, they suggest, is to keep the board small. Oh, how I agree with this. A committee should consist of three people, two of whom are usually absent. There is nothing more draining than a huge board where everyone feels that they have to talk about everything, whether they know about it or not, and so meetings drag on forever!

Making a list of the talents you need seems so obvious that it hardly needs saying and yet many boards are stomping grounds for old cronies rather than those experienced in a relevant sector. Irish boards in particular seem to be a roll call of the same old faces over and over again; people that might have experience but whose multiple board memberships must surely dilute their enthusiasm for innovation in each case.

Look for help in finding the right people, suggests Forbes, by either talking to business friends or employing someone to do the task. Of course, you can employ head-hunting companies and still make the wrong choices! But if you contact prospective board members to discuss the company and the board's duties, maybe you can avoid appointing inappropriate people.

This seems self-evident, too, yet I've been asked to get involved in certain organisations when I haven't had the faintest idea of what I would be required to do - and the people asking me didn't seem to have the faintest idea either.

Forbes also suggests that a company should be flexible about its board members, both defining the duties that they currently need to take on but being aware that as the company evolves so should the board. This is an interesting concept as, quite often, people stay on boards or committees for far too long.

Experience is only one part of an overall talent pool. Innovation is equally important. So Forbes suggests that you should set terms for your board members and make "re-upping" procedures very clear. Another very important aspect of filling your board's seats is (as they term it) Filling the Money Bags.

And by that they mean making sure you have a financial expert who will be able to fund the company as it moves forwards. Then, when you've decided on people, you should show them the ropes, introducing them to the business and all aspects of the operation. I worked in a number of different companies over my career and it was only in one of those companies that I ever met the members of the board, or where the members of the board made it their business to meet the employees.

A guideline close to my heart is to avoid the trivial. Don't spend hours at a meeting reading memos and reports.

And finally, Forbes suggests, you should develop trust on the board by not springing any surprises. Which, in the case of anyone who's going to be involved in the Dublin Airport Authority, might be the key factor in keeping the whole show on the road (or in the skies).