As complexity increases, board members can no longer rely on traditional governance models and board agendas alone to make strategic shifts. They must evolve toward a systems-thinking approach—one that considers the broader, interconnected challenges and opportunities related to key issues of today’s world, such as economic cycles, artificial intelligence, and ESG. This is where board stewardship becomes critical. Stewardship is about purposeful and responsible leadership that creates long-term value by fostering resilience, inclusivity, and collaboration across the organization. Unlike “leadership as usual,” stewardship requires adopting a holistic view, enabling board members to navigate complexity and embed purpose at the core of business performance.
The Business Case for Stewardship
For board members, adopting a stewardship mindset means understanding how risk, resilience, and opportunity are intertwined with purpose. This shift helps directors rise above short-term decision-making and enables leaders across the organization to embed purpose into business performance. Stewardship equips boards to handle the demands of today’s business landscape—marked by uncertainty, stakeholder pressures, and competing priorities.
However, as highlighted in Egon Zehnder’s recent report, “Stewardship for a Resilient Business,” while most board members are keenly feeling the pressures of this increased complexity, many of them feel underequipped to fully embrace this role. This is not due to a lack of intent but rather due to challenges such as rigidity of the board agenda, insufficient knowledge of how to get started, and board dynamics. Our research shows that while directors recognize the need to evolve, they often struggle to break free from traditional structures and mindsets.
“The change that is needed does not take a revolution. It doesn’t involve fundamentally overturning the way in which the capitalist system works. But it does need some significant alterations, in particular the notion that companies are there to make money and to create value for those who work in them and invest in them but to do so in a way that comes from creating benefits for others. […] The underlying drive of that profit then is to solve problems, not to create problems for others.” – Colin Mayer, Author and Emeritus Professor of the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford
Dealing with Complexity
The complexity of today’s business environment requires boards to adopt a systems-thinking approach. Many boards are still structured around a siloed approach that inhibits them from fully grasping the interconnected nature of their challenges. At Egon Zehnder, we define complexity as the interrelation of multiple, unpredictable factors that create uncertainty. Traditional approaches often fall short in this context, as they do not account for unpredictable interactions within the business ecosystem.
“As boards begin to understand complexity, their idea of what a board is shifts. Boards were originally formed to respond to the demands of an orderly, predictable world. Directors waste so many resources on this basis, and they encourage their senior executives to do the same. Boards struggle to grapple with complex issues, and therefore can’t hold their executives to account.” - Jennifer Garvey Berger, Author and CEO of Cultivating Leadership
Directors often feel like they are expected to have all the answers. By adopting a systems-wide perspective, they can make more informed decisions that balance long-term goals with immediate needs—but developing systems-level skills is not an easy change to make.
“A systems thinker has the ability to step back and calm oneself because one is having to consider a full system. Right now, most of us live our waking hours on ‘slices of systems’.” – Nancy Gillis, Senior Director, Industrial Pathways Transformation at the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), in an interview for our Stewardship Conversations blog series.
Nancy outlines three dimensions for systems-thinking that directors could adopt:
- Zooming out to provide space for thinking;
- Understanding what a system is by thinking about how individuals within the system engage and communicate with one another;
- Fine-tuning their own listening skills by actively seeking to understand the meaning behind words.
Navigating Stakeholder Demands
As businesses increasingly face political, societal, and environmental pressures, board members must navigate a wide array of stakeholder demands. Recent research by Egon Zehnder in partnership with Kearney revealed that employees across generations, contrary to popular belief, largely desire the same things:
- Purposeful work
- Ethical leadership
- Sustainable practices
This presents a powerful opportunity for board members to align organizational goals with these shared values, using stewardship as a guiding principle. A board composed of diverse voices is key to making stewardship work in practice. Representation across gender, ethnicity, age, and functional expertise can broaden the board’s perspective, making it better equipped to address sustainability and resilience.
One emerging practice is the incorporation of “Next Gen Boards,” which bring younger, often underrepresented voices into conversations. This approach helps foster diverse perspectives and prepares future leaders while addressing sustainability and risk from multiple angles.
“Where the value of next-generation boards is already being recognized, it is by companies and organizations who understand the value is both shared and multiple,” – Rebecca Robins, Founder and CEO, Board Trustee, EY Foundation and author.
Uncovering these voices creates a more inclusive organization, enhances the decision-making process and passes forward opportunities for professional growth—setting the organization apart from others.
The Role of Board Culture
Inclusion is more than representation; it is about creating a space where all voices are genuinely heard, leading to richer discussions and better decisions. The board Chair plays a pivotal role in setting the tone for a dynamic, inclusive board environment that draws out the best from each board member. Equally important is the willingness of directors to be open to new ideas.
Adopting a stewardship mindset often requires unlearning long-held habits and embracing new ways of thinking. This includes engaging in conversations that might otherwise have remained unsaid.
“It’s the unknown. It’s the unimagined. We don’t know what questions to ask because we lack experience. So, we need to find a way to make these unimagined things imagined. Turning this complexity into a linear narrative so we can talk about it in a fair equal value way.” – Tony Fish, author, Board Trustee at the Institute of Neurodiversity (ION) and Visiting Fellow at Henley Business School for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.
By encouraging different thinking and embracing diverse perspectives, boards can drive substantial change and redefine their impact to address challenges more effectively.
Inner Work for Resilient Board Members
At the individual level, progress starts with aligning board members’ personal purpose with the broader purpose of the organization they serve. Useful prompts might be:
- What problems am I passionate about solving?
- How can I leverage my skills, experience, and network to contribute to the solution?
- How can I balance my fiduciary duties with my moral obligations to society and the environment?
This mindset shift also entails embracing lifelong learning and a continuous learning mindset, not only to keep up with the latest trends and challenges but also to cultivate a growth mindset. This includes willingness to challenge their own assumptions, especially in areas where they may not have been traditionally engaged.
A “servant-leader” mindset is also central to this shift. Board members are uniquely positioned to unlock opportunities for collaboration across regions, industries, and cultures. They can bring unique experiences into the boardroom, driving cross-pollination of ideas and solutions that can reshape industries and tackle global challenges.
“Boards can also reframe their identity as custodians for the common good, for society and sustainability, and be a little bit more creative and generative rather than overlooking and seeing where all the risks are and all the liabilities. It’s a shift from accountability to creativity. They have a journey to go on. By doing so, they become more resilient leaders, better prepared to navigate uncertainty and complexity,” emphasizes Sander Tideman, author, social entrepreneur and executive coach in sustainable change leadership.
Making Intent a Reality
While stewardship is uncharted territory for many board members, we see it as an essential journey to start if we are to move from intent to reality. Throughout our report “Stewardship for a Resilient Business,”
- We invite board members to reflect on the barriers that may be holding them back.
- We remind them that there are no “quick wins.”
- We encourage them to act, as now is the time to step into this new era of leadership.
The complexity of today’s business landscape demands a new outlook on board leadership—one that is collaborative, resilient, and deeply purpose-driven. By embracing stewardship, directors can set a precedent by shifting from words to action. Through their practices, dynamics, and culture, these directors can create a new paradigm for board governance.
