NED & Non-Exec Chairman – The First Meeting With a New Company 27 December, 2007
Posted by Simon Webber in Board Member, Chairman, Chairmen, corporate, Corporate Governance, cost, director, experience, first meeting, governance, growing companies, growing company, idsquared, NED, NEDs, non-executive director, Non-Executive Directors, payment, private equity, remuneration, Simon Webber, skills, small company, tips, Venture Capital.trackback
As you well know, the first meeting with a new company is a vitally important one. We advise our client companies on how to approach a first meeting with a potential Non-Executive Director or Chairman and you may be interested to hear what we say:
Introductions - we always recommend that our clients give a potential new Board member a call
Exchange Information – do send the company a copy of your full CV and ask for a copy of their business plan or whatever other information is available. There’s no point spending valuable time in your first meeting explaining what you used to do for a living and finding out what the company does.
Meet at their place – whilst it’s lovely to be taken out for dinner or to get together at the latest bar, we’re sure you’ll want to get ‘beneath the skin’ of the business so we recommend that first meetings always take place at the company’s premises.
Don’t try too hard – (sorry about this one!) we always tell our clients that this first meeting should be friendly and relaxed but above all it should be productive and business-like so we tell them not to bother with the Michelin starred meal or the bottle of Château Pétrus at the Board table.
As a final ice breaker, IDsquared include on our profiles a few of your interests. So don’t be surprised if they open the conversation by dazzling you with their knowledge of 1950s Bentleys or sailing haunts in Dalmatia!
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