By Dee Lundy-Charles
FOR the third consecutive year, a room full of board directors and senior executives from the region have gathered in Saint Lucia to participate in the Caribbean Governance Training Institute’s annual conference on Hot Topics in Corporate Governance, and in an unprecedented hat trick, CGTI has once again delivered a unique, stimulating and reality-challenging two days of world class training and expertise to an appreciative crowd.
This year’s experts, led as usual by the inimitable Dr. Chris Bart, explored the impact of director behaviour on the effectiveness of board governance. This included introducing delegates from Turks and Caicos, Grenada, Dominica, Antigua, St. Kitts and Saint Lucia to the importance of having a healthy boardroom culture, where the complex issues faced by organisations require a different style of leadership more than ever before.
Faculty included: Dr. Gregory McQueen, an applied ethicist who advises world leaders and Dr. Phil on moral reasoning; Dr. David Kunsch, an expert in critical thinking and ‘deviant’ board behaviours; Dr. Min Basadur, a global expert on creative problem solving, who has consulted with major international organisations from Google to Pfizer; and Dr. Steven Stein, internationally renowned author of “Emotional Intelligence For Dummies” and consulting psychologist to the Amazing Race, Big Brother and other reality TV shows.
If all this sounds a bit dry, do not be fooled by the erudite subject titles; over the course of two days, delegates saw another side of ‘being on the board’, and experienced their own personal journey through an onslaught of challenging questions, conflicting choices and self-analysis exercises. The CGTI approach to board governance is not what one might expect given the old fashioned image of boards throughout the Caribbean; the dress code is casual and there is nothing stuffy about the passionate, learned experts who deliver fascinating contemporary content riddled with real life examples of when governance goes spectacularly awry – think Enron and Arthur Andersen. These guys know their subject matter, and although there is no “one size fits all” solution to the issues of governance, every session spoke to the importance of taking the behavioural tools provided by the Hot Topic Conference and personalising them to suit each individual and each board.
Two days later, after a slew of lessons learnt – like how to use clear, unambiguous language in the boardroom and how to collaborate when competing perspectives get in the way of good decision-making – the delegates left the third Hot Topics Conference like they were walking on air. Their reality had truly been challenged by the experience and they discovered easy-win opportunities to take back to their organisations, as well as an understanding that changing the existing culture takes time, patience and an appreciation of diverse points of view.
Among the delegates, Kenrick Walters, Head of Investment Funds, Business Development and Relationship Manager at Bordier Bank in Turks and Caicos, came to the CGTI conference with high expectations and found they were exceeded. “I feel confident I am coming away with a lot of new knowledge and understanding. I think this has really opened up my perspective on the role and responsibilities of a director, and I look forward to getting back to T&C and applying some of the skills, ideas and knowledge I’ve learned here.”
Julie Bonnett, Human Resource Director at Renwick and Company in Saint Lucia, was also impressed with the conference. “I found it to be very enlightening; we were given practical examples and useful tools to bring back to our board. I’m excited about that and I’m sure my company will want to implement some of the ideas immediately.”
Ernest Bleasdille is a Director of the Communal Credit Union in Grenada, who travelled to Saint Lucia for the Hot Topics Conference: “The course taught me that you need to be more interactive with clients. I have not done any training in emotional intelligence before, and it shows how important it is to understand the people in the business, from the customer to the board members”.
In his closing comments, CGTI Chairman Dr. Chris Bart was delighted with the success of the event, which he described as the only conference in the world to cover the wide-ranging and fundamental role that boardroom behaviours play in improving the effectiveness of corporate governance.
“What happens behind closed boardroom doors can make a big difference between a high performing organisation and a failing one,” stated Dr. Bart, who closed the conference by announcing the launch of The Caribbean Institute of Directors (CIoD), an organisation uniquely tailored to the needs of Caribbean boards, directors and senior executives.
According to Dr. Bart: “The intention of the CIoD is to promote professional standards for directors that Caribbean organisations will be proud to support, and shareholders – and other stakeholders – will come to expect of their boards. Our Institute will not only address the ‘mechanics’ of being a competent 21st century director, but will also focus on the best practices and principles of being a director who is constructively involved in defining the role of his or her company in Caribbean society”.
Lisa Charles, CEO of the Institute and founding partner of CGTI also stated: “Our conversations with corporate executives and delegates make it clear that the need for this Institute is essential. The Caribbean Governance Training Institute will contribute significant start-up funds and expertise in key areas of corporate governance. In addition, we have leading experts and advisors in the creation and development of high performance boards”.
After only three years, Saint Lucia-based CGTI is emerging as the premier governance training provider in the region, evidenced by some of the big name clients that have signed up for their programs. Currently all members of the Board of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank have taken the Chartered Directors (C.Dir.) course, and Sandals International have engaged two groups of execs in Jamaica thus far, including Deputy Chairman and CEO of the company, Adam Stewart who is a big fan of CGTI.
As Dr. Chris Bart says: “CGTI exists to change the way governance emerges in the Caribbean region. It’s a game of inches, but we are confident in the CGTI faculty’s skill, expertise and knowledge to provide the right training, thereby ensuring that the quality of board governance in the region continues to improve and strengthen.”
Our political dinosaurs will be hard pressed to perfunctorily continue with their bluffing empty rhetoric with such enlightening discussions taking place in the region. It is little wonder that some are sounding so eerily senile during and since the last election campaign.