Liselotte Engstam, Chair and NED

Liselotte Engstam is a thought-leading Swedish director, with board mandates at digitally transforming and sustainably focused international companies. She initiated research on governance for innovation that resulted in the article “Innovation and corporate renewal also disrupts boards” and an upcoming book. We asked her to share some of her conclusions with us. 

“The research identified three competencies that boards need to master to create suitable conditions for corporate renewal: sensing, pivoting, and aligning. Sensing refers to the competence that enables you to connect with and develop new insights into, the company’s external environment. It’s a key competence to develop, because we found that most board directors lack strong understanding of the dynamics of their firms’ industries”.  She continues: “Pivoting refers to the competence to use the insights to adjust, or newly create the future of the business. Lastly, aligning refers to the competence to ensure agile decision-making and resource allocation turning the pivots into a new reality”.

Liselotte stresses the importance of sensing as a first step, only after you can sense your environment can you pivot. “While all of these competencies are crucial, I’m passionate about encouraging directors to spend more time outside of their bubble, talking to experts, travelling to other parts of the world to get inspired, and learning about new board responsibilities such as digital transformation or sustainability”. To facilitate this, she designs board education programs and set up a learning circle for directors, the Dighoshen Exploring Leaders network. In this circle various topics are discussed, from sustainability to geopolitics and from design thinking to AI.

What are you doing to stay in touch with your environment? How do you learn about new trends?