Governance Bites #84: managing tension in the boardroom, with Josh Comrie

In this episode, Mark Banicevich speaks with recovering entrepreneur Josh Comrie about managing tension and conflict in the boardroom. He asks how you identify early signs of tension, and how you address them before they escalate. Josh outlines strategies he has found effective for resolving conflicts and maintaining productivity in board meetings. They discuss preparing for potentially contentious topics on the agenda, how to encourage healthy debate, and dealing with power dynamics. Josh also shares advice for newer directors who find themselves dealing with this type of conflict.
Josh Comrie is a recovered serial entrepreneur. Now he is a business adviser and conference speaker, helping ambitious entrepreneurs to grow and exit profitable, fulfilling businesses. Prior to this, he founded or co-founded several businesses, including The Attention Agency, Flying Kiwi Angels, Ambit, Potentia and Aspire Executive Search. His governance career includes director roles on several of his startups, and former President of the Entrepreneurs’ Organisation (NZ). Josh’s ebook, “The Exit Factor: Sell your company for a life-changing sum”, is available at www.joshcomrie.com, and his podcast, "2 Commas", is available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. 
#governance, #leadership, #corporategovernance, #boardcraft, #decisionmaking, #makingadifference, #ceo, #governancebites, #boardroom, #entrepreneur, #succession, #2commas

Transcript

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Hey, I'm Josh. I'm here today with Mark. He's going to introduce himself because it's his show. Let's face it, you're here for him, not me. So, I'm best described as a recovering entrepreneur, recovering founder. So, started half a dozen different ventures across four different spaces: tech, services, AI [artificial intelligence] product and a property syndicate. And so, about three or four years ago, I hung my spurs up as CEO [Chief Executive Officer] of my last venture and headed into the space of assisting folks in, particularly scale-ups, that wanted to get their business ready for exit. So, I focus around the exit readiness base. I have a podcast that talks about that, relatively newly launched but getting some great coverage so far. It's called "Two Commas", and I'm just in the process of writing a book on entrepreneurship as well,

called "Wantrepreneur: 0:44

Don't Start a Business Until You've Read This Book". And you can't wait to read that book, can you, Mark? You bet I can't. You bet I can't. And we're going to talk today about managing tension and conflict in the boardroom. Yeah. Hi, welcome to Governance Bites. My name is Mark Banicevich, and as you just heard, today I get to spend time with my old friend, Josh Comrie. Josh, thank you very much for your time. What a pleasure to be here, Mark. It's interesting that you describe yourself as a recovering entrepreneur, because I think I described you as a serial entrepreneur. So, I think "recovering" is probably a better term now that you've, - Yeah. - as you say, you've given up that part of the role and now you just want to help others get through to those seven-figure exits. Yeah. So, really interested in this conversation with you. The first question I have for you is, how do you identify early signs of tension in the boardroom, and how do you address them before they escalate? Yeah. I'll just point one thing out: 7+ figure exit, so "Two Commas" means 7+. Already had $100 million-plus guests on the podcast, but anyway. So, early signs are classic kind of relationship signs, actually. You know, a setting that is at the board table is not that much different from a setting which is the executive table or the individual contributors, or indeed if you're sitting on the family table, as well. The relationships that are sitting behind that. And so, there's some hallmarks which are quite similar: blaming, shaming, not taking responsibility, playing the man and not the ball (or the woman and not the ball), not addressing the bigger issue that we're there to focus on and trying to achieve, and kind of getting stuck in detail and calling each other names is a really classic example of that. So, that's kind of early signs of tension or conflict. What I like to think about is a continuum. And so, an ex-business partner of mine says,"There's not much of the world I can't describe without the use of a Venn diagram and a continuum."

We'll stick the continuum for today's purposes: 2:32

at one end is harmony, at the other end is conflict, and in the middle is tension. Now, harmony seems like it's a great place to be, but the magic does not happen there. No. So, what I mean by that is that people are being nice to each other, there's platitudes, there's placation that will go on, potentially sycophantic behaviour as well, you know, saying yes, being yes people around the board table. And so, harmony feels good in the moment, but it's not productive. Conflict is the other end of that continuum, where you descend into a place of non-productivity. And it's those things like blaming, shaming, lack of responsibility, lack of accountability for things, and just being, you know, kind of direct with each other, overly direct with each other, and not in a focus on what we're trying to solve for here in that particular day. Tension is that space in the middle, and what I try and work with people on is spending as much time in that middle space as possible, because tension, it's like chemistry in a relationship between people, it's when things rub up against each other and the magic really happens. And so you get productive conversations, you get interesting insights, and you get innovation that comes out of those things. Plus all people are able to have their views heard fully, and you can work through things on a basis which is helpful, and gets to an outcome where everybody feels like they've contributed to that thing, even if they don't necessarily feel like it's the thing that they wanted, but they've had the ability to talk to that thing effectively. Yes. Right. Okay. So, having identified some early stages of tension, what strategies or techniques have you found the most effective in resolving conflict and getting it back to that nice sweet spot of tension and maintaining that productivity in the boardroom? I try not to get there in the first place, which is a really easy thing to say. And so, the techniques that I use are making sure that I have a strong personal relationship with each person that's in and around the room. And so, if I'm chairing that situation that is. Also, if I'm a contributor to the conversation, I am not the chair, then I think, you know, that good, positive dialogue is an important thing to maintain outside of the boardroom and talking about things which are not just about the conversation that's at hand there, because that maintains a positive relationship, and an ability to drop back to that place if that's what you need to be able to do. So, if it does descend into conflict, then what I remind people of doing is that, you know, we're here to resolve an issue, we're not here to talk about each other or what has gone on in the past. People can often go back to what has been the history of the relationship or where things may not have gone as well as they could have hoped that they could have gone. And so, you know, getting grounded in what it is that we're trying to be there to solve for on that particular day. If necessary, I'll stop a meeting and I'll take people out of the room. So, I've had to do that on more than one occasion in the past. It is treating people a little bit like kids, and I'm aware of that, but if you descend into that outright conflict, it's not productive for the overall kind of unison of the group. And so, if you see, because someone has to lose when you have an argument, right. And so, I haven't seen this happen in the past, but I understand board meetings have descended to blows, historically, because people have very strong views where they haven't been able to air those things properly. But if you have a fight, be it a verbal fight or a physical fight, kind of someone has to win that thing, and that's really not great for the overall kind of group unison and having a, you know, productive environment. It's a long-term relationship too, right. If you descend into conflict in this board meeting, it's going to carry over into future conversations, future board meetings. Conceivably. So, and it is, as you say, it's all about relationships and making sure that you're debating issues rather than arguing about personalities or pointing fingers and blaming. 100%. Yeah. And behaviour of other people as well. You know, someone may have been in the wrong, but calling them out on that in that setting cannot really be ideal because there's great ways of doing things, and not great ways of achieving the same ends. You know, for me personally, I always maintain a very level and calm voice and demeanour, and even if I'm, I can feel the, kind of, the build of, you know, be it cortisol, you know, the stress hormone, or be it another one, if I feel this myself getting angry, then I just kind of make sure I maintain that place of calm and just a real sense of kind of normality and a nice slow pace, and that might mean my voice is coming across quite flat, but the intonation, you know, they say something like 70% of communication is from the tone you use of your voice, and it's very easy to drop into that place of being a bit angry or pointing fingers or, you know, kind of doing this thing. And so, just being a really calm, raising the pitch, the timbre of my voice slightly so that it kind of appears to be a little softer can really help the dialogue, I've found. Right. Okay, that's interesting. There are, of course, some topics when you look at an agenda where you think, "That one's probably going to cause some problems." Are there ways that you can potentially prepare for those topics in advance of the board meeting, and what would you do? Yeah. I get out in front of it with the individuals concerned. So, I'm not averse to having dialogue with folk before the board meeting so that we can talk through that thing and kind of get people to reason through what their opinion and what their objective might be as it relates to that thing. So, at least that way they're able to turn up and articulate it very clearly to the others in the room what it is that they're trying to achieve, not shut them down. I don't want to have that conversation outside of the boardroom, but I want to help them work through that context effectively so that they can just be clear about what it is that's important to them. I might try and get a view from them on how they're going to act in relation to that potentially tense or sensitive subject, and just make sure that they feel like, you know, it's a safe environment. And so, that means not descending into blame, not kind of calling out people on their behaviour, you know, doing that sort of thing. I have called people out on the way that they've behaved and acted in that forum, but just making sure that I'm kind of maintaining that calm, level demeanour is really super important. Yeah. There's the old maxim that you use in education in all forms as well, right, where you, you give positive feedback in public, and you give the constructive stuff in private. That's right. Which can be very helpful. Interestingly, I once heard someone say that, "I would never call a meeting unless I know what the outcome is." That's extreme, right down the very far end, because I think the purpose of a board, be it advisory, governance, or, you know, full directorship kind of boards, is the ability to debate effectively the issues at hand and then work through to the right outcome, or at least work through to an outcome - Yes. - and then have a plan in place to be able to go about checking to see whether or not that met the objectives that you were trying to solve for at that particular time. If you already knew the outcome, you wouldn't need a meeting at all anyway, right. Sometimes that is the state of some boards, you know, particularly, you know, family-oriented things we've found in the past. Right. Well, on that note actually, what do you do if they're too far the other way? If you've got a collegiate board that is too much in the happy space, everyone agrees, how do you encourage that tension and debate to get different views out? Yeah, great question. So, actually, I kind of ask people if I believe that they have an alternative view, get them to speak up about that. So, "You know, the other day we were talking about this,"and you mentioned that perhaps this could be an idea, or this could be a bit of a problem that we might face"if that's an action that we take. And so, you know, tell us a bit more about that." And so, you know, prompt them so that they feel like it's okay to kind of bring it up. And so, that's one method. I've seen things done in the past where you kind of write things down on a piece of paper and then you pull them out and someone else has to read that thing. Oh, yeah. So, that's kind of a creative way of getting everyone's voice across. Yeah. I've seen them done digitally, so people can communicate their ideas written down. Pop out anonymous ideas into the boardroom. Yes, exactly. So, you get the old anonymous login, and so there's just ideas that are presented and you can debate the ideas. Right. That's a nice approach. Yeah. So there's some. It's kind of variations of your Six Thinking Hats, right. [Edward de Bono.]"Everyone put your green hats on now and let's be creative. Nothing's a bad idea." Right. I love de Bono's Six Thinking Hats. Yeah. He's a legend. Yeah, absolutely. If you've got, you can have some boardrooms, and families is a good example of this, you may have boards where you've got a lot of executive directors and there's power dynamics going on. So, you know, having disagreements between executives, dominant personalities, how do you deal with those kinds of issues? Not dissimilarly. So, people are people. And so giving them the ability to feel that they can contribute productively and that everyone has a voice inside that room, and that there's also a process for making decisions. So, because those power dynamics can go both ways where you have someone that may not necessarily have the right, based upon the constitution of that particular board, to be able to make a decision, but they quite clearly have the power base. You know, you want to make sure that that thing doesn't take over, as well. So, just ensuring that there's, you know, productive dialogue, safe space, you know, those sorts of things that are a little bit woke, but they create the environment for a positive conversation that can lead to a better outcome, I believe. Right. Yes, absolutely. What do you do if you've got, I mean, as you get more experience with the board, you'll identify there are some people that have some pretty deeply entrenched positions. And sometimes you'll have people on two different sides with different entrenched positions. So, how do you kind of reach, you don't necessarily always have to have a consensus to make a decision, but it leads to a more positive place if you do. How do you deal with those entrenched positions? Yeah. So, sometimes you may not reach consensus and so then just being clear that this is the decision that we're making, these are the reasons that we are making it, and this is the hypothesis that we have going into that decision. Then you can check in and review to make sure that, was it correct? Was our thinking correct? And can we back out of that thing effectively? Jeff Bezos talks about the "least regrets" framework as being one of the things that you look at with the decision-making process and also being cognizant of what are the decisions that have huge consequences around them. You know, the things that are very, very difficult for us to back out of. There's not many of those things in life, in all reality. And someone I'm working with the other day said something very pithy. He said that typically things are a lot easier to get into

than they are to get out of: 12:31

a marriage, a business partnership, a contract for something. You know, getting that thing done in the first place can be quite easy. So, just being aware of, you know, what the path for that particular decision might be. And sometimes planning those possible exits, as well, before you go in, right. Yeah. "If this doesn't go well, how would we get out of it?" Yeah. You know, I've encountered through my career, in the managed fund space, you know, hindsight's always a great way to learn, isn't it, where you've got some of the old managed funds where they got smaller and smaller pools of people investing in them, and there's more modern and newer funds that people are better off investing in, but they're finding themselves in a position where they have to go to the original investors and say, "We'd like to move you over here," and there's always someone that'll say, "No," regardless of whether or not it's in their best interest. Right. Yes. So, planning for those things in advance to say, "Okay, what will we do if or when?" and having a, you know,"Oh, that thing has happened, what was our preparation, what was our strategy, again, for that?" Yeah. Both scenario and risk planning is kind of what we're talking about there. Yes, it is. And I don't see that as being something in my experience that's terrifically well done in New Zealand, in following up to check in to see, "What was the consequence of the decision that we made? And what would we do"in an equal and equivalent situation in the future? And what is it that we're now going to do based upon"what we know today that we didn't know six to twelve months ago?" You know, applying that hindsight. Because I think there's not enough necessarily of that reflection based upon where we got to, having now that base of knowledge behind us. You raised another thing there about debriefing. You know, quite often we put a project in place and it may, or it may not go well. At the end of it, we don't sit down and say, "What went well, and what didn't? And if we were to do something like this again,"what are our learnings?" Yes. And we should get much, much better at that, shouldn't we. Agreed. Yeah. A last question for you. What advice would you give to a new director on navigating conflicts with, you know, other people on the board that maybe are a little bit more dominant and so forth? Yeah. So, the first and probably the most important to me is be curious, right. So, it's a wonderful way to get people to talk about things on a basis that doesn't feel confrontational to them. And so, if someone has a viewpoint that is an alternative to what you are, then just be open and curious with them. And so, "Oh, that's really interesting. How do you imagine that's going to play out"across our need to increase our presence in the APAC [Asia Pacific] region?" For example. You know, so go back to what the objectives are, and then just kind of ask some probing questions. Avoid the use of "why" where possible. "Why" is a very confrontational and overly direct question. It forces someone to justify their position. So, a curiosity is, "Tell me more," or, "How do you think"that would impact upon?" or, "I'm really curious as to where you think that might kind of, you know,"drive us in the future based upon what we're trying to achieve." Watch the tone of your voice. Don't confront that person. Don't take the bully down in the yard unless you feel like that's, you know, highly necessary and you're the right person to do that. That's a bit of a ballsy power move and could backfire. If you're the newbie, it's probably not a good plan. Probably could backfire for you. And then kind of just make sure that you're being conciliatory sometimes and you're massaging the relationship at other times and that you might support some people on some things and then challenge them on other things so that you're kind of maintaining that, you know, you're part of keeping things in a positive tension place, and not being based on too much harmony or descending into conflict. Right. And in that curiosity, you maybe even, you'll even be open to the possibility that you are wrong. Exactly. But yeah, so hopefully that dialogue, that discussion will bring out a little bit more, and between you, you might come up with, "What about this? What if we did this?" 100%. Yeah. Great. Okay. Well, Josh, thanks very much, mate. Real pleasure, Mark. It's been great to catch up. Great to talk. Great to have a chat. Congratulations on "Two Commas". Thank you. I love the way that that's going for you. Thank you so much. And I look forward to reading that book. Yeah. And we'll see you next episode. Nice one. Cheers. Thank you for watching this episode of Governance Bites. We have more episodes on YouTube and your favourite podcast channel where I interview directors and experts on various topics relating to boards of directors and governance. We'd love to see you back and please like, subscribe and share the videos and podcasts.