Learn & lunch at SHIFT

SHIFT is an early-stage venture capital fund. They believe that innovation plays a crucial role in rebalancing the world we live in, and those purpose-driven start-ups are the main drivers of innovation. SHIFT regards impact and solid financial returns to be mutually reinforcing factors. While they invest in a variety of sectors, they always remain focused on one aspect: creating impact.

For their investment managers, associates and analysts SHIFT organizes the so-called ‘lunch & learn’ meetings. Anne Mieke was invited to share her experience as an independent chair and our vision on the future of boards. An important change in the scaling-up process of a company is the composition of the supervisory board. As part of an investment process and closure, it is a need and formal decision of the investors to create a supervisory board. 

The key topics in our discussions were: Who should be part of it? What kind of expertise is needed to fit future needs? Diversity in all kinds of ways is a pre-condition. A healthy balance of people means there should not only be investors in the available seats, which is a bold statement for a venture capital fund. It’s essential to include entrepreneurial, independent professionals with a zest for sustainability, exploration, and co-creation. Sounds simple but is not always a given. Identifying growth opportunities and focusing on long-term value creation is an act of true collaboration between the two boards.

We think that boards not only need diverse expertise, but also different types of (creative) mindsets to take businesses to the next level.

Are you composing your board with this broad interpretation of diversity?