There is still some confusion regarding the difference between a company board of directors and an advisory board.
How can companies benefit from having an advisory board?
I learned a lot from building an advisory board in Los Angeles in 1999-2000. I managed to recruit top-level people front Yahoo and other well-known companies and they were very valuable in several ways.
The company board of directors should represent the stockowners.
Therefore it makes no sense for a small, owner-led company to have external people in the company board, especially if the CEO is also the majority shareholder.
A company board also should not have individual experts in law, economy etc, instead the board should focus on strategic long-term value growth. It’s better to buy specific expertise when you need it.
It is very difficult to recruit top-level people to the board of a small company since the members of the board are also personally liable for the company finances and taxes etc. And if you find a willing high-calibre external board member you probably have to pay up substantially.
But this also means that an advisory board could be an especially valuable strategic asset to an owner-led company.
An advisory board should preferably consist of 3-5 members with very varying backgrounds, coming from different business areas and perhaps having expert skills in things like marketing, social media, future trends and communication. They can then freely advise the board of directors and management on how to reach the company goals (set up by the board of directors) and help with connections from their personal networks.
The trick is to find the right people for the advisory board and create a win-win situation. Since you want top-level people but don’t want to pay high fees you have to offer something else of value.
Begin by listing a dream team of well-known people that you think might be interested in your endeavour. Ideally they should complement each other and not be acquainted. Present your list to these people and explain that this will be a high-calibre advisory board for a company with an exciting potential and interesting business networking for the members.
Then create very fun advisory board meetings about once every quarter where you organize brainstorming sessions over a decent dinner.
Make sure the advisory board members get PR for their efforts by writing about them in your news letters, press releases etc, building value for your own company in the process.
Greenpeace in Sweden today sent out a news letter with a smart way of letting people personalize a Greenpeace anti-whaling video and email it to their friends:
The idea is that you can write your own texts that are inserted in the Greenpeace campaign video, so you can send a personal message inside the video to your friends. This a a creative way of using video for viral marketing! Click the image to try it yourself.
Greenpeace has probably borrowed the idea from Bob Dylan who made a very cool Facebook application where you can write your own text signs that Bob Dylan is displaying in his old music video.
Videobloggaren Björn Falkevik på Lidne Inc. intervjuar Henrik Ahlén om styrkan med video som kommunikationsbärare och fördelarna med att använda video i företagssammanhang.
My favourite pastime when I am riding a bus or the underground is to watch video clips on my iPod Touch from the american elite conference TED (Technology Entertainment Design). It “brings together the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).”
They made the smart decision to post all of those talks online, and they do it in a very professional way. Watch some of them and then contemplate: Would you want to attend a TED conference in the future? Or would you rather just watch the videos? Well, millions have already watched the videos and TED is sold out every year a long time ahead.
For example, they have a new rating system for the videos: Most jawdropping, most persuasive, most inspiring, most courageous, most fascinating, most ingenious, most beautiful and funniest.
The famous talk by the Swedish researcher Hans Rosling talk “New insights on poverty and life around the world “is in the “Most jawdropping” category, you will understand why!
It is interesting to note that Hans Rosling held his first talk on TED in 2006 and ever since this talk was posted online he has received speaking requests from all over the world.
I use this smart online application for to do’s and reminders. It has an outstandingly easy and fast interface. RTM also has a very useful mobile version that you access with your mobile’s web browser (no plugins necessary).
For example, I make notes about things to buy when I am in the city. Then I can access these notes on my mobile when I am shopping. Very convenient.
RTM is free to use and comes in many different languages, including Swedish!
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