Smart Software in the Age of the Coronavirus: 5 Reasons to Upgrade Now

The impact of COVID-19 (aka coronavirus) has been swift and severe. 

Governments around the world are scrambling to respond, business and civic leadership struggle to reassure, and last week the stock market took a giant nosedive, losing over $3 trillion in market value. 

At the same time, Zoom Video Communications’ stock has risen dramatically, and Zoom has added 2.22 million monthly active users so far this year — that’s more than the 1.99 million it added during all of 2019.

This statistic points to a powerful, sobering truth: In times of crisis, smart software solves problems — both expected and unexpected.

Smart software means peace of mind and crisis-ready process at the top of the house. In a world where chaos is the new normal, leaders need to be agile and have the real-time intelligence to do great work.

Here’s why NOW is the time for top of house teams to adopt smart software.

1. CRISIS DOESN’T WAIT. In a world where fear can cause massive shifts in the stock market, leaders must be ready to react to these kinds of black swan events at the drop of a hat. Preparing for the unexpected is part of doing business. Whether it is the coronavirus, a stock market drop off, or an internal company crisis, there is always less time to react than you need.

   The people who need to communicate earliest and most often in a crisis are the board and the c-suite. Crisis is when we need agile teams at the top of the house. Oddly, it is the top of house teams who often have the least interconnectedness. It’s an anachronism. A crisis doesn’t wait until you are ready. Smart software is ready when you are.
   

2. TRAVEL IS VULNERABLE. Annual meeting season usually means one thing: travel. But experts project that the Coronavirus will impact all kinds of group gatherings. They are recommending that people prepare for possible school closures, travel disruption, and market disruptions. What is traditionally a gathering of the board in person may need to be, for the first time, a gathering of the board over the web. The norms of business will need to adjust.

   While the Coronavirus scare may feel temporary, this kind of communication challenge — and interruption to our business norms — is only becoming more common. The truth is that as businesses embrace remote work, they are beginning to see travel as less of a luxury and more of an expensive inefficiency that can be problematic for the environment, unreliable, and potentially bad for your health. The future of agile work is in the cloud.
   

3. COMMUNICATION DEMANDS CONTEXT. Remote meetings help minimize the threat to public health by reducing our risk of passing a virus from person to person. Video conferencing feels personal, unlike phone-only conference calls, and can provide a secure connection, unlike email or text. And while distance meetings are a great solution for public health, remote meetings are only part of the solution for business teams.

   The strength of any communication solution is in the context. 

   The real trick is allowing everyone to have all relevant information, integrated data, communications, schedules, and project data with real time updates at their fingertips from any device — whether that is a computer in the office, a smartphone at the airport, or an iPad on the beach! 

   Smart software is that complete secure hub, layering robust communications features on top of remote video conferencing to replace the time, expense and potential risks of travel.
   

4. PROCESS MATTERS. What did you do as the coronavirus crisis began to grow? Did you start to make a mental list of the other key people on your team you needed to talk to? Did you know how to find them quickly and securely? How many people had sensitive conversations about crisis management and board information over text or email that would have been better off through a more secure line of communication?

   Boards, c-suites and top of house teams who have a process for communicating on a dedicated software platform will be more nimble, efficient and reactive in times of crisis like this one. Those who do not plan for this will be left to scramble anew each time.

   For boards and c-suites who spend much of their time on the road and away from each other, building the habit of connecting in a personal way between meetings means building a new way of doing business — and being seamlessly prepared for the next crisis.. 
   

5. REMOTE WORK IS NOT THE FUTURE. IT’S ALREADY HERE. Almost 5 million Americans identify as digital nomads, and HBR identified the “work from anywhere” policy as an emerging trend in business — noting that 43% of American workers have spent at least some time working remotely. Common fears of lower productivity or focus seem unfounded — studies are showing that remote workers are actually more productive. 

   The move toward remote work is happening. It’s about agile work and taking advantage of the ability to work anywhere, anytime. Top of house teams need to be out in front with this, adapting to and leading the way. As offices begin to relax their walls, boards and c-suites that embrace smart software will be leading the way, not playing catch up. 

   Even when this crisis subsides, the reality of remote work as the future of work will continue to grow. 

In Conclusion

Our founders have 100+ years of top of house experience between us. We’ve been there so we know what it takes to do great work.

Cloud Concinnity® is a comprehensive, turn-key workspace for top of house teams and mission critical processes. And because we know crisis doesn’t wait, we can have you up and running in a matter of days. 

If your leadership needs to step up your planning to the potential problems of the coronavirus, call us now. 

It’s not too late. We’re ready to help.

Click here to start the conversation. 

7 Secret Process Weapons for D&O Questionnaire & Proxy Season

D&O Questionnaire and Proxy season is upon us once more.

You may notice a tinge of dread in the air as everyone returns from their holiday travels and picks through their email inboxes. Visions of documents, signatures and checklists dance in their heads — the prospect of late nights and long email chains looming on the horizon.

The good news? 

It doesn’t have to hurt so much. 

There is a solution, and we have it.

Cloud Concinnity® is the secret process weapon for high quality performance.

Smart technology applied to repeatable processes is the secret weapon for this stressful season.

The D&O Questionnaire process doesn’t have to hurt so much. Proxy season need not overwhelm. Annual meeting prep doesn’t have to bring everything else to a grinding halt.

We’ve built a process engine around the needs of top of house executives and board directors. 

Our founding team has over 100 years of collective experience in the boardroom and C-suite, both serving and advising, so we are more than a little familiar with the anxieties of the season. 

Top of house productivity requires tools tailored to executive leaders.

With these secret weapons, your time is well spent where you make your greatest contributions: shaping the story of your company to the world.

Here’s what that looks like.

7 Secret Process Weapons for D&O Questionnaire & Proxy Season

1. Centralize with an Everything Hub

Imagine how much more quickly things could come together if all of the documents and their related communications, signatures and due dates were securely stored together in one place, easily accessible on any device, anytime. What are you going to do with all that free time?

2. Simplify & Empower Your D&O Questionnaire

Cloud Concinnity® stores all of your D&O information from last year, so your Directors and Executives can simply update it as needed. Now you can prepare proxy disclosures on director credentials, independence and any related party transactions seamlessly — without chasing everyone down.

3. Automate Proxy Preparation

Cloud Concinnity® comes with a starter bundle of pre-configured “Proxy Material Preparation” processes so you’re ready to go on day one. Dates, deadlines and schedules help streamline the predictable work, and custom workflows make it simple to adapt as-you-go, no matter what your company’s processes require.

4. Streamline your Annual Meeting Needs

Cloud Concinnity® comes pre-loaded with timeframes and action steps built on top of annual meeting best practices. No more wondering whether there is a better method. There is. And we built it. Nothing is forgotten. Everything is streamlined.

5. Meet SEC Compliance Requirements In Advance

We build your SEC regulatory calendar and assistance for meeting your disclosure requirements right into the tool. Instead of scrambling for specifics at the last minute, you’ll have everything ready to go well in advance.

6. Bulletproof Security

Cloud Concinnity® is SOC2 certified, meaning anything you do inside our software is protected by the most secure software standards in the world. You determine who can access materials, so you can limit conversations to those with the need to know, even have counsel conduct attorney-client privileged communications, when needed. Speak freely about sensitive topics with peace of mind you’ll never get on email, text or other tools.

7. Build Strong Habits

When board directors and executives have their communication muscles in shape, firing off quick messages to your trusted inner circle becomes a superpower. What feels overwhelming can be dealt with swiftly and efficiently, keeping anxiety low and allowing for fast action.

In Conclusion

The D&O Questionnaire process doesn’t have to hurt so much. Proxy season doesn’t have to induce panic. Annual meeting preparation doesn’t have to bring everything else to a grinding halt.

Top of house productivity requires top of house tools. 

Process is the secret weapon of high performance. 

Let smart technology applied to repeatable processes be your secret weapon this season.

Click here to learn more about how CC helps with D&O and Proxy Season.

3 Imperatives for Leveraging Technology in 2020

While 2020 still conjures up images of flying cars and robot maids, it’s not some far off concept anymore. It’s right around the corner. Cars may not fly (yet) but technology is powerfully making business life easier. 

2020 is the time to bring the power of technology into your C-suite to transform mission critical processes. It’s one of the most powerful things you can do to ensure performance against 2020 deliverables.

Here are 3 ways to take full advantage of today’s smarter technology for your mission-critical processes in 2020.

Ditch your Communication Friction.

Friction is fractured communication. Jumping from chat to email to your phone to file storage and back again — just to get your work done. Collaboration is challenge enough in this age of hacking and cyber-risk, and old channels are simply not suited for sensitive, high-level conversations. 

Technology should make things easier, not more confusing.

Timely and secure communication is essential for effective delivery of your mission critical agenda. Smarter technology, like Cloud Concinnity®, can eliminate communication friction.  It puts things like texts, documents, shared tasks and metrics in one place and pairs that ease with bullet-proof SOC 2 security.  

Invest now in smart technology to elevate effective leadership communications around your most important 2020 initiatives.

Invite Automation to the Table.

Speed and specificity is what makes leading work. Strategy points the boat, but process moves it forward. Even with an assistant keeping track of everything or turning the gears behind the scenes, the details and mundane logistics of process and scheduling can gum up the gears. Automating what’s repeated and routine is the next level, freeing up brain power to focus on growth and progress, for executives and assistants both.

Targeted automation will transform your efficiency at the top of house.

Smarter technology like Cloud Concinnity® will coordinate alerts and timelines behind the scenes, saving everyone hours of overlapping double-checks. Complicated internal processes like strategic growth initiatives, regulatory compliance, risk management and governance management can be streamlined by connecting the key players on a dedicated, secure platform. 

Your 2020 depends on consistent timely execution. Without smart technology you leave opportunity on the table and success at risk.  

Join the best leadership teams who’ve discovered that process has never been so dialed in.

Bring your Data Out of Hiding

If your key metrics and deliverables are not front and center every day at a glance, you are risking failed 2020 objectives.

More often than not, the reason you don’t have a clear idea of those numbers is because of a lag in how that information is tracked and displayed, not because that information doesn’t exist.

Cloud Concinnity® uses smarter technology to consolidate KPI’s in a way that makes the complex simple and the convoluted elegant. It’s about integrating secure transparency where it can actually make a difference.

Facilitating a laser focus on data and metrics is how smart technology changes the game. Imagine the impact on accountability if your leadership had a simple, timely way to see high level KPI numbers on a single, secure dashboard.

Imagine 2020 results delivered.

In Conclusion

When it comes to leveraging smarter technology for your mission-critical processes, 2020 is the year to make it happen. 

In a world where chaos is the new normal, smarter technology makes leaders more agile, and agile leaders drive higher performance and better governance. Smarter technology and real-time intelligence elevates performance, drives agility, and creates the freedom to think.

2020 is the time for your team to level up. If you want more information on how your team can level up in 2020, let’s start the conversation. 

3 Reasons Why You Need Smarter Technology to Survive & Thrive with a Corporate Integrity Agreement

Most often, news of a Corporate Integrity Agreement (CIA) feels like a dark cloud descending over the near-term future. Especially for those who are responsible for fulfilling the obligations. 

But in truth, a CIA is a new beginning. 

If you’re like most companies, your existing technology infrastructure is nowhere near ready to handle the increase in documentation, report generation or new communication expectations. You will need to automate as much as possible. 

CIA implementation is the perfect moment to build up your internal compliance processes. Successful completion of a CIA’s requirements demonstrates to the world that you have the government’s seal of approval on how you manage healthcare regulatory activity. 

Bottom line? Creating and embedding the structure and process required for a CIA sets your organization for long-term success. 

And the best way to build that structure is with the smarter technology of Cloud Concinnity®. 

Here’s why.

Data Cannot Hide

Implementing a CIA means your organization will need to create and maintain documentation of the seven elements that contribute to the effectiveness of a Corporate Compliance Program. And you’ll need to create and document specific CIA requirements related to those elements, conduct additional processes that require coordination and consistency, and submit certifications of compliance from one or more leadership teams, including a board level compliance committee, not to mention implementation and annual reports to OIG. 

Existing technology solutions are simply not configured to handle the complex web of high level conversations that will need to happen. Suddenly everyone will need to exchange and share sensitive information at a pace and volume never before seen. Whatever tools led up to the CIA, it’s time to put them out to pasture. Smarter technology is truly the only way to provide granular control over document sharing and oversight reporting with bullet-proof security protocols that function seamlessly for 24/7, on-the-go executives and compliance professionals who are working at all hours around the world. 

Process Should Empower

You’re about to need more overlapping processes than you ever thought possible. There is simply too much work to handle with paper and pen and the occasional spreadsheet. Too many organizations try to lean on the existing compliance program or other departmental processes. What got you here won’t get you much farther. 

Process must empower, not hinder. 

Smart, agile technology is the only way to simplify, centralize and automate the range of complex execution and oversight steps involved in your more robust compliance program. For example, activity triggers for standard, continuing compliance program tasks and for  the new crop of sequential CIA tasks and deadlines will keep everyone aligned, coordinated and engaged in a way that paper and pen never could. Automated precision workflows and tasks supported by industry-leading communication security and document storage mean a team can keep pace with the rapid increase in monitoring and reporting demands.

Compliance Must be Creative with Challenge

While compliance has a reputation for being a bureaucratic burden, it is also a catalyst for creative growth and a chance to proactively organize up. The fact that every step of your CIA and compliance journey will need to be verified, documented, and archived means that people, processes and systems will need to get more robust and more efficient at the same time. The kind of communication and out of the box thinking that makes a compliance program work will challenge your compliance team to learn, grow and get creative. 

It’s overwhelming. Unless your team gets creative. 

Finding smart software that can handle the digital logistics means that the people on your team have room to discover a new way of doing compliant business. After implementing your CIA and at the same time adding new people, processes and technologies, you’ll have already upgraded your team and resources, proving that your compliance program is first class and ready to handle any new business initiatives or growth. 

In Conclusion

What you need is a centralized, streamlined, secure CIA implementation vehicle that simultaneously upgrades your regulatory compliance infrastructure. 

And that’s what we’ve built. 

A well-oiled, SOC2 certified platform custom-built for the emerging needs of top of house leaders in a regulated business world. 

If you’re ready to see how smarter software can implement your Corporate Integrity Agreement and also transform your corporate compliance program, reach out to our team and explore your options. We love this stuff!

Why Better Technology Means Better ESG Disclosures

Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) principles are fast becoming required criteria in a company’s corporate story.

Yesterday’s lip service to corporate responsibility efforts and token statements about environmental and financial sustainability are no substitute for today’s call for an analysis of real ESG metrics and reports. Investors increasingly expect companies to explain the drivers of their success, including the key performance indicators of success, mitigation of any perceived risks and some measurement of the sustainability of the factors that drive success. Inasmuch as purpose and culture are drivers of sustainability, ESG measures the value of a company seen through the lens of its values.

Investment firms like Black Rock, State Street, and Vanguard have taken a leadership role in articulating the relationship between ESG and corporate success; for that reason they have led the call for more robust ESG disclosures. Business Roundtable has broadened the purpose of a corporation to include “embracing sustainable practices.” It’s clear that every business needs to create a strong ESG story.

And the only way to tell a good ESG story is with great ESG data.

How can better technology create better ESG disclosures?

1. Data Shouldn’t Hide

Data wants to be free, and with smarter technology, it can be looked at in real time, all the time. For the evolving awareness of ESG data, this is a watershed moment.

A data-centric, data-focused, and data-transparent company has a very real advantage over its competitors, especially in these early, “wild west” days of ESG reporting.

And better data starts with with better communication between the top of house.

The top of house must rally around key questions like:

• What is the current process around creating your ESG disclosure?

• How does your website give out that information and how do you present it?

• What do your investors want to know in the financial disclosure about ESG?

Smarter technology empowers the top of house to have these conversations in a safe, secure forum where everyone who needs to share information can do so without fear of internal miscommunications or hackers from the outside.

Access to the right information means better communication and more collaboration on the ESG story — something that can’t happen without smarter technology.

2. There is Power in the Process

Smarter process is the next secret to telling a powerful ESG disclosure story.

Because good ESG metrics require coordination between a complex network of overlapping internal departments and, ultimately, input from the board, the C-suite, and executives at every level, teams need strong workflows to move the right information through the right channels. This cannot happen efficiently without technology, and ideally automated workflows — there are simply too many people and too many moving parts involved to keep up by hand.

Streamlined processes that lean into automation, workflow technology, and collaboration are the pillars of powerful coordination, transparency, and creativity that a strong ESG story demands.

3. You Can’t Argue With Proof

ESG metrics may be in their infancy, but documentation is a timeless way to prove a point. Whether using the SASB Materiality Map or some other metric matrix, good data doesn’t lie.

Your ESG story will do well to weave documentation and proof into the foundation of how you tell your company story. GreenBiz tells us that to build the foundation for a strong ESG story that aligns with your brand, begin by refreshing your sustainability report, committing to ongoing communication, and engaging external influencers. 

We couldn’t agree more.

Smarter technology is what gives you the ability to document compliance along the way.

Top of house voices need to coordinate from the beginning so that all of this data is aligned with investor, boardroom, and executive goals. The ESG story must be a united story.

In Conclusion

When it comes to telling a strong ESG story, making sure the data doesn’t hide, streamlining communication and information gathering processes, and prioritizing digital documentation all mean your ESG story will be a strong one. And the importance of telling that ESG story is only growing.

3 Reasons Why Risk Management Needs Smarter Technology

Enterprise Risk Management continues to evolve and become ever-more complex. Realities like increasing government regulation, looming cyber-risk, and the new unknowns of digital and marketplace disruption demand that boards and C-suites take a more proactive role in risk management.

But as the need for better, more informed risk management skyrockets, technology solutions struggle to keep up. To deliver risk management and oversight well in today’s business environment, what we need is smarter technology.

Here’s why:

1. Growing Oversight Complexity

After decades of evolving regulatory reforms that started in the ’80s and new levels of risk awareness growing out of the 2008 financial crisis — not to mention the unknowns of cyber-risk — the risk management oversight imperative is more complex than ever, requiring ever more time and insight to do well.

As Nitish Idnani of Deloitte points out in WSJ, technology is both a cause of disruption and one of the remedies. He says,

“…it's important that leadership formally examine the effects of technology changes on operational risk profiles and manage those impacts…” Monitoring this interaction often demonstrates both internally and externally—to regulators and shareholders—that the C-suite and board have engaged in providing sufficient oversight.”

Smarter technology is the only way for leadership to effectively manage this enterprise-wide risk oversight, with the C-suite managing day-to-day strategy and the board providing supportive oversight, ensuring that all necessary information and communication both organized and tracked.

2. The Emerging Collaboration Imperative

First, boards added risk committees. Then, boards spread the risk conversation across every committee. Now, it’s clear that risk management needs to be on everyone’s plate. It’s also clear that there is no single expert.

As Derick Hughes of Ethical Boardroom points out in his examination of risk oversight trends, today’s risk management requires collaboration between CEOs and board members.

“CEOs will be working more with boards not only to create and generate value for investors but also to protect value by implementing effective risk management procedures and setting up risk committees and processes as required. Investors in particular are looking for risk management with regards to managing volatility of earnings of companies.”

We need the board and executives to collaborate around identifying and assessing risks while working alongside subject-matter experts who can examine challenges with an eye toward prevention. This means coordination between the board and anyone in the company responsible for risk oversight or management, as well as internal coordination between board committees and their departmental counterparts in the company.

How can a complex and layered conversation like this happen best? On a smart technology platform that is highly secure, easily documented, and custom-designed for success. It is far too important to be left to a patchwork solution or public channels that will never be secure enough.

3. The Measurement Mandate

In a rapidly changing business environment, keeping risk front and center in an easy-to-understand format is critical. At the same time, regulators want more detailed data and investors are are including risk management in ESG metrics they use to make investment decisions.

Daniel Moore, Chief Risk Officer at Scotiabank, points out in a recent interview with McKinsey about effective anti-money laundering in banking, that part of the solution is better technology that has the capability to facilitate the communication and measurement, which then helps with understanding, implementation, or potential litigation.

Moore offers:

“Every form of risk, including [Anti-Money Laundering], should have KRIs (Key Risk Indicators) to assess the inherent risk, the mitigators, and the residual risk…

Communication and relationships are important in whatever jurisdiction you’re operating in—relationships with the regulator, bringing them along on the journey. In many jurisdictions, including the US, we’ve seen a shift in regulatory expectations where they are more open to a focus on the use of analytics to produce better outcomes.”

The interconnected needs of a range of stakeholders that includes the board, executive teams, regulators and investors demands an integrated solution. The answer is smart software with real-time documentation and communication that translates seamlessly to metrics, and all of that information needs to be both comprehensive and easy to splice for a wide variety of uses.

In Conclusion

Today’s risk management requires more engagement and oversight from the top, deeper collaboration between staff, management and boards, and meaningful measurement. The only way to get this is with smarter technology that goes far beyond the board portal, and even beyond most GRC or ERM softwares on the market.

Cloud Concinnity® is designed to meet just such challenges. And the subject matter experts who designed it built it to be custom configurable to the specifics of each enterprise. It is the most secure way forward for every business ready to do what it takes. That’s what smart technology can do. Demand it for your enterprise and rest easier.

How Cloud Concinnity® Minimizes Litigation Risk

A funny thing happens whenever we show Cloud Concinnity® to sophisticated board members.

They fall in love with the freedom it gives them to have earlier and unrestricted access to board material, to message other board members on particular topics, and to better track the thread of conversations since they are grouped around the work being performed.

But if those board members have ever been on a board that has been sued they ask - in horrified tones – "Doesn’t documentation of what we’ve done and said create additional discoverable documentation?”

The short and of course lawyerly answer is, “It depends.”

A better question is, “If technology does create more discoverable documentation, how might we organize our work so that it’s a good thing?”

The digital transformation is upon us, and it ultimately creates more documentation of words and actions. In this climate, boards need to be leaders in taking advantage of newer, disruptive (in a good way) technologies as part of adjusting to the atmosphere of increasing change.

Counsel’s thinking must adjust to the new normals created by technical advances. While respecting and encouraging communication as critical to the deliberative process, we should also recognize the advantages technology provides when the right processes are implemented and board decisions are effectively and appropriately documented.

Here’s how.

How Cloud Concinnity® Increases Board Communication & Minimizes Board Litigation Risk

1. Putting Risk in Context

Cloud Concinnity provides board members with a secure messaging channel to avoid the perils of using their own unencrypted email systems when discussing board business with the company or with other board members. A secure messaging channel’s benefits outweigh its risks. Messaging allows immediate reactions to fast-paced activities. It encourages board engagement; directors can interact with each other and with management in between meetings as they work together in the secure Cloud Concinnity workspace.

But veterans of litigation caution clients that very little good happens in casual communications like emails and texts; they often contain “smoking guns” that inevitably lead to defensible cases being settled. Often comments taken out of context appear extremely damaging. The defense has to work hard to neutralize such “sound bites”.

An example perhaps silly, but illustrative, is an email that says, “the chair is uncomfortable”. While potentially devastating in litigation about the board's approval of a transaction, that same comment is entirely innocuous in the context of ordering furniture for the boardroom.

Because Cloud Concinnity provides a single board communication hub, discovery risk is contained within the context of relevant conversations; all of the messaging from board members that would otherwise occur on insecure email systems now happens, instead, in a single, secure workspace. Because conversations are focused on the work at hand, context is provided, and participants are less likely to dash off unthoughtful comments.

Cloud Concinnity’s enhanced ability to document the board’s activities protects board members from personal liability. Cloud Concinnity both facilitates and documents that the board has carried out its legally required duties; all of the facts, relevant documents and actions are on Cloud Concinnity. Extraneous emails, texts, or other non-board-related communications that could be open to discovery in litigation that explores individual member conduct are less likely to be required if a board uses Cloud Concinnity properly, as the secure repository for all activity related to board member performance.

2. Clarifying Litigation Discovery

Board member conduct becomes a topic of “discovery” in 2 main contexts. The most common is in derivative shareholder litigation, where the company’s stock has lost value and the shareholders sue on behalf of the company’s interest to hold board members personally liable for breaching their fiduciary duties of loyalty or of due care to the company.

The less common, but more concerning, is where the board’s conduct is being investigated as part of a governmental inquiry into company conduct. In either of those situations, the best course is to keep the inquiry focused on the most relevant, primary source of company and board information - Cloud Concinnity.

In the first instance, if the issue at hand is the extent of board oversight or whether the board exercised appropriate business judgment when it decided something material, the best record of what the board knew, what documents directors reviewed, what meetings were held and what conversations took place, those are best evidenced by the complete record, available on Cloud Concinnity.

The wider afield discovery goes the more chance of finding some comment that doesn’t have an obvious explanation, and the greater the chance of opening doors that should stay closed. In those situations where a plaintiff or a government agency would seek discovery of relevant communications, the company and board members have a very strong argument that there is no reason to turn over board members’ private emails or texts, thereby avoiding the exposure of private conversations and minimizing the expense of legal review.

Cloud Concinnity corrals all board-related documents and conversation into one place, which should help on two fronts; it’s more secure from data breaches, and it could prevent additional, non-relevant discovery of extraneous emails that directors sent from their own separate email accounts. Boards that use Cloud Concinnity will be safer overall in litigation.

They will gain a strong defensive position that, barring exceptional circumstances, discovery of the board’s communications with each other and with the company should be limited to company emails and Cloud Concinnity. Such limitation will significantly lower risk and the legal expense of reviewing reams of non-relevant emails and documents.

3. Wrapping Day to Day Work in Best Practices

Cloud Concinnity functions as both a sword and a shield. It is a sword, because Cloud Concinnity provides board processes (workflows) that build in best governance practices. It is a shield because Cloud Concinnity can provide the company with the proof those best practices were done. This makes any lititgation brought more easily dismissed or summary judgment more easily obtained.

The proof is in the documented activities accomplished in the workflows; these easily establish that the board met its legal responsibilities, i.e., it appropriately exercised its business judgment in making material decisions, it carried out oversight responsibilities, and that it complied with SEC governance and other legal requirements. The proof is easily available, accessible and easily produced with Cloud Concinnity - saving effort and resources.

4. Managing The New Era of Messaging

To go back to the first topic discussed, does Cloud Concinnity create more risk because more conversations are documented there than now would otherwise occur? More messaging does not necessarily carry any more or less risk than any other form of communication. If a board messages something indiscrete, whether in a chat or in personal email, or even just said out loud, it may be discovered. There is very little that stays secret these days, and technology can’t cure stupid (although we are working on it!).

We currently advise our clients to train Cloud Concinnity users, particularly board members, to be aware that what they message could be saved, what they do on the Cloud Concinnity work platform is presumed to be board and company related, so thoughtful behavior is always best. Cloud Concinnity integrates the way directors work with management and with each other; integrated access, process and outcome management are maximized using messaging and other innovative technologies. The result? a more engaged, more effective and safer board experience.

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Heidi Allen is Co-founder and Chief Development + Legal Officer of The Concinnity Company. Former Assistant US Attorney. 25+ years experience advising executive teams & boards of directors about managing risk. Former GC and Corporate Secretary of public healthcare company. Graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Rutgers School of Law.

Welcome Michael D'Amico, The Concinnity Company's new Director of Business Development

We are thrilled to welcome Michael D’Amico as The Concinnity Company’s new Director of Business Development. Michael joins Concinnity from Donnelley Financial where he served as a Director in the Global Capital Markets vertical for over 10 years, leading strategic business development primarily in the Southeast.

Prior to DFIN, Michael served in operations, sales and management capacities at Bowne & Co. He brings a record of success and expertise in expanding revenue, building crucial relationships, and structuring innovative solutions for companies operating at the highest levels of global business.

Nancy Falls, Concinnity Company CEO, said:

“Hiring Michael brings tremendous capacity to our team and our ability to serve the unique needs of directors and officers in complex organizations with our
game changing software. We are extremely
happy to have him on board.”

David Rue, Concinnity Company CRO, added:

“I’m absolutely thrilled to welcome Michael to The Concinnity Company. He has a tremendous reputation for innovation and an intense focus on customer service. He has distinguished himself as a pioneer in technologies in service to his public company and mutual fund clients. Michael and I worked together for almost 20 years and it’s an honor for me to be working with him again.” — David Rue, Chief Revenue Officer

We sat down with Michael to hear about his new role

What are you looking forward to about joining The Concinnity team?

What The Concinnity Company is doing to reshape this industry is exciting, and that is incredibly motivating. The intensity and intelligence behind what Cloud Concinnity® represents is contagious, and you can see how the passion for the work lights up everyone’s faces in the office. I am looking forward to being able to work in a place where everyone on the team does what it takes to get the job done and has fun doing it. It was easy to say yes when I got the opportunity to join the team.

What do you love about working with leaders in the C-Suite?

I love working with smart, innovative people. My entire career has been working with the C-suite in all kinds of industries, and I love seeing people take a need, fulfill it, and figure out a way to deploy that solution throughout the company.

One of the things that attracted me most to Cloud Concinnity® is its power to simplify and drive processes across the entire organization, which is difficult to come by without intelligent software. It’s exciting to be part of helping leaders save time and money and avoid risk by deploying smart technology to accomplish ambitious goals. Being able to simplify and automate critical processes quarter after quarter is a beautiful thing.

What draws you to the technology behind Cloud Concinnity®?

The Cloud Concinnity Company is bringing valuable enhancements to how management board rooms and advisors approach company performance, corporate governance and shareholder value. We have an elegant technology that is easy to use and fully scalable to service the challenges that senior leadership teams and the board room face regularly.

Joining the Concinnity team was a no brainer. I am so grateful to be working with old friends as well as an extremely talented team of professionals. I look forward to spreading the word, growing our business and ultimately helping our customers.

How are you enjoying your return to Nashville?

I split my time now between Atlanta and Nashville, and I have a deep love for both cities. I remember living in Nashville when the city first started growing into what it is now, and it is amazing to come back as part of The Concinnity Company team. I moved to Atlanta a while back with my family, which is a fantastic city as well, so I am lucky enough to be part of two great areas. I love being part of the energy and diversity of the city, and I love being able to be part of Atlanta and Nashville as they both continue to grow.

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Read the official press release about Michael D’Amico's appointment to The Concinnity Company.

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5 Biases That Hold Boards Back

In today’s business world, chaos often feels like the new normal. To stay on top of it all, growth and change are not optional — they need to be the focus of an ongoing conversation for every board of directors.

Too often we see stale, stagnating biases hold boards back from taking new opportunities by the horns and turning the page. Here are 5 of those biases every board director can look for to get that conversation started.

1. Defend & Extend Mentality. When a board focuses too closely on defending and extending the “core” business strategy of the company, the world will pass you by. While taking care of the core is always a good idea, it should be in the DNA of every board director to offer an outside perspective, be a disruptive thinker, and act as a voice for change. Think about the directors on your board — how often is someone bringing up new, disruptive ideas? How many of your conversations are anticipating where your industry will be years down the line?

2. Traditionalism. The first time someone on your board justifies a process or an action step with “…Because we’ve always done it this way,” you can be sure that everyone needs to take a step back and reassess. While there is nothing wrong with preserving tradition or holding onto processes and rituals that work, a problem arises when the board defaults to believing that things are better because they are traditions. In a world evolving as rapidly as ours, not every tradition can endure. Is your board holding onto any traditions (like board books or committee processes) that used to work but need to be updated?

3. Baby Boomer. This one is a media favorite that can be easy to exaggerate, but the bias here can be insidious. When boomers believe (consciously or subconsciously) that they and other Boomers know best, the board is in some trouble. Today’s boards need a diversity of opinion to thrive — and that means across gender, race, and age. Look around your board — is everyone a Baby Boomer? If so, it’s time to start the hard conversations.

4. Technophobia. People fear technology for many reasons. Adopting new tech can be challenging, especially for those who spent the first 20 years of a career without it. It means investing time into a new system, taking many board directors out of their comfort zone at a time in their careers when they are used to being experts. Some people are (rightly) wary of ever-evolving cyber-risk. But at this point in business, avoiding tech puts any team at a gigantic disadvantage, severely limiting the options of boards who need to be agile in the face of business chaos. Tech has been the enabler of product transformation, marketing opportunities, data analysis and process innovation. An understanding of its possibilities is critical for strategic thinking. Look at how your board does business — is it utilizing tech wherever it can? Or is it resisting new tools that are revolutionizing what today’s leaders can do?

5. Board Stagnation. Everyone wants to hold on to a good gig and do their part, but being afraid of rotating in new people and refreshing a board’s makeup is the beginning of decay. Forgetting to prioritize fresh perspectives and new blood can creep up on even the best teams. The solution is implementing a regular review process and considering term limits for board directors. Even if you’re not bringing in new board directors every year, you can bring in outside experts or coaches to stir the pot. Think about the last few years on your board — has much changed? And if not, what can you do to drive what’s next?

These are not the only biases that can drag on a board, but they are prime examples of the kind of thinking that can hold a company back. We all have things to uncover about ourselves and our teams that are hindering our business growth. The point is not to ask yourself which of these are holding your board or company back — the point is to have an ongoing conversation among your leadership about what can be done to keep everyone moving forward and not get caught in the inertia of bias.

Cloud Concinnity® is a powerful tool for transcending these biases. It is a software platform custom built for today’s connected leaders, who must facilitate the complex processes required to manage and govern today’s companies. It makes real change possible by providing a forum for important conversations. It brings together the best of process management tools, board management software, team collaboration and GRC software into one central, simple, secure hub.

In a world where chaos is the new normal, Cloud Concinnity® gives boards, c-suites, and investors the power to be as agile as they need to be. Click here to learn more about how the right tool can help your team transcend hidden bias and finally start having the important conversations.

5 Reasons Why Your General Counsel Will Love Cloud Concinnity®

3 minute read

As the role of the General Counsel evolves, the technology needs of GCs evolve as well. It is no longer enough to weigh in when the business team identifies the need for contractual, compliance or regulatory assistance; a GC must be informed, proactive and a driving force behind critical conversations.

We know that the earlier a GC gets involved in a project, the better the likelihood of avoiding legal repercussions. And we also know that in order to be counselors in the truest sense of the term, GCs need to offer innovative strategies that legally support the business goals. Indeed, savvy legal advice is critical business acumen.

Here is why your Legal Team will love Cloud Concinnity®.

1. Discovery Prepared. Keeping up with regulatory requirements and corporate compliance, let alone preventing and managing litigation, is a complex, consuming and resource-demanding task. That’s why we’ve automated documentation of regulatory compliance in Cloud Concinnity®. Instead of having to gather records from disparate email or messaging accounts and calendars, every task accomplished, every meeting and message on topic is automatically logged in a searchable database. When you need to demonstrate compliance with regulatory or litigation duties of care, it’s where you can easily find and produce it. When you need to prove that your board has exercised its fiduciary duties in the face of potential litigation, the records are there.

2. Simplified Oversight. We prioritize and simplify oversight. Your board and your company’s senior leaders need to discuss governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) & boardroom matters at a high level, with the reassurance that they have the information they need, when they need it. Our ability to automate workflows that both conduct and document the oversight of GRC activities enables the board to oversee management’s reporting systems that spot anomalies and red flags. There is no other tool out there designed specifically for these needs: secure, documented and simple. With Cloud Concinnity®, GCs and other senior users monitor mission-critical activities and communications on a single dashboard, fed by data sources of your choosing. No more silent risk creeping up when you least expect it.

3. Automated Processes. Certain seasons of the year mean sleepless nights and stressful weekends for the entire executive team, but especially the legal team. So we designed Cloud Concinnity® to make it easy to get all those whose participation is needed on the same page about key filing dates for regulatory compliance and enterprise risk management. Work that can be automated is made easier. Rather than spending hundreds of hours manually producing and managing tasks, our software transforms checklists and spreadsheets into automated workflows. You can reliably simplify the monumental task of coordinating and obtaining everything you need from everyone in the company on schedule. This will free up swaths of time and mental energy so you can focus on substance, rather than rushing to meet due dates every year.

4. Proactive Prevention. GCs have historically been the “defenders in chief,” and that role will of course continue to be as important as it has ever been. But in today’s legal climate, getting out in front of risk is the way to win. Because Cloud Concinnity® is designed for high level conversations, it is a powerful tool to create the tone at the top, which will drive the prioritization of compliance throughout. Setting the bar for ethical and legal compliance, and initiating important risk conversations that are months or years ahead of others in your marketplace is much easier when there is a tool that exists for just such conversations. The habit of high level conversations means more team agreement and better proactive communication around identifying and neutralizing risks.

5. A Place for Culture. Considerations about having a healthy corporate culture have never been more critical — even when they are not popular. And for better or worse, it often falls to GCs to bring up thorny topics. Conversations about issues like sustainability, #MeToo, trade policy and diversity have always been important, but in today’s climate, senior leaders ignore or minimize them at their peril. Again, creating a place where those conversations can be ongoing rather than periodic, and can make room for all voices over a period of time means that those conversations can evolve and make room for the research and interactions they truly need. Corporate culture, the company’s reputation, and things that may be “legal” but not advisable in light of stakeholder interests all find a home here as well.

As GCs and legal teams become more visible and influential with the business leadership, we are proud to provide a technology that powers real change. If your senior leadership team is ready to step into discovery preparedness, simplified oversight, proactive prevention and better conversations about culture, we’d love to hear from you.

Click here to send our co-founder and CLO Heidi Allen an email and hear about why she has made Cloud Concinnity® her mission, or click here to watch a brief overview of Cloud Concinnity®.

How to Discover Your Board’s Hidden Strengths & Weaknesses

Building a high performance board begins with understanding what skills your board is strong in today and what skills gaps you need to fill tomorrow. Like Goldilocks searched for juuuuust the right porridge, every board must search for just the right director makeup. Right size, right composition, and right structure support boardroom harmony. Wrong size, composition, or structure can mean boardroom breakdown.

While finding that perfect boardroom magic will always involve some intangibles, we believe there is a way to quantify the foundation for success. There is a code that can be cracked based on information you can put on paper.

The key is to utilize a board skills matrix.

Utilizing the Board Skills Matrix

We look at functional skills, core competencies, and other critical criteria, assessing each board member to get a sense of the board’s overall skillset. Once quantified, we can understand where the board as a whole is strong versus where there are skillset gaps and start to create a long-term plan.

With this information, we can be more precise in risk management and crisis planning, better allocate resources between meetings, and understand what we are looking for in new board directors down the line.

Here is a sample of what a board matrix might look like:

We invite you to take the board matrix challenge and see what you learn about the strengths and weaknesses of your board.

This is an example of the kind of best-practices-thinking we build into the DNA of Cloud Concinnity®, and we hope it jumpstarts a fresh way to understand the potential of your board.

You are welcome to download our matrix spreadsheet to use for your own board, or to use as a model for creating your own matrix. if you would like access to the linked sheet, simply request access from our administrator when you are on the linked spreadsheet. If you cannot access this sheet or want a different version, contact us for more details.

Click here for an introduction into what Cloud Concinnity can do for your board.

6 Ways to Transform Your Annual Meeting Process

Process is powerful.

Year after year and boardroom after boardroom, we see that smart, repeatable processes are what separate great leadership teams from the good ones.

And at no other time of the year is that more obvious than annual meeting time.

Every spring brings week after week of documents, research, signatures, and checklists that zap time, money, and resources from administrative personnel. For Board Secretaries, GC’s, CFOs and their teams, it is a season of late nights, countless emails, and chasing executives down to dot the required “i’s” and cross the required “t’s.”

But it doesn’t have to be so hard.

Here are 6 Ways Cloud Concinnity® can Transform the Annual Meeting Process

1. Slash the time spent on outreach by hosting everyone’s documents and all related communications in one place. Imagine how much more easily and quickly things could come together if all of the documents and their related communications, signatures and due dates were securely stored together in the cloud and easily accessible. No more email inboxes. No more text messages. No more voicemails. No more misunderstandings. It’s all there, every time you log in.
   

2. Simply update information (like the D&O Questionnaire) rather than starting over every year. Instead of spending hours hunting people down to fill out forms and information that everyone is too busy to spend time on, Cloud Concinnity® stores that information. Fill it out once and it gets stored in a shared database. Instead of starting over each year, simply nudge the right people to update their information and everyone spends a fraction of the time (and a fraction of the bother) to get it handled.
   

3. Eliminate mistakes and reduce variability with automated workflows. Imagine the peace of mind knowing that every step in your annual meeting process was happening exactly how you need it to happen, and exactly the same way every year. Cloud Concinnity® comes pre-loaded with a set of standard “starter” workflows that bundle frequently associated tasks together. For example, if you need sign offs on a particular document in advance of the meeting, there’s a workflow for that. Need to automate your own check lists and processes in Cloud Concinnity®? No problem. Design custom workflows that will go off like clockwork and can be updated as needed.
   

4. Easily meet SEC compliance requirements in advance. With Cloud Concinnity®, every deadline and draft distribution is created automatically via customizable workflows, reducing the last minute crunch as filing deadlines loom. No more endless gathering. Everything is gathered and logged in a searchable database as they happen.
   

5. Have safe conversations with a centralized system. On top of tying together communications and related documents, tasks and deadlines in one place, communicating in Cloud Concinnity® is safer than email, text and most other tools. We’ve built a layer of our own security on top of everything so that communication on Cloud Concinnity® is as secure as it gets, which we know is critical for sensitive materials like the annual report, proxy and annual meeting conversations.
   

6. Build on established communication patterns with your board members. This is the elephant in the boardroom that no one talks enough about — communication. When it’s good, it’s good. When it’s bad, things take what feels like forever. One of the most powerful aspects of Cloud Concinnity® is that it offers everyone on the senior leadership and boardroom team a single, secure hub for communicating about board matters. When everyone gets used to doing that all year, annual meeting tasks will be part of a smooth system — not another thing nagging everyone in their email inbox.
   

Process is indeed powerful, and building the great processes and communication habits that will make next year’s annual meeting smooth sailing can start now. If you ignore the annual meeting until next spring, it’s going to hurt just as bad next year. But if you use annual meeting “off season” to get smarter technology in place, the next year will feel like a breath of fresh air.

The Irreducible Minimum: What Every Board Director Should Know

Serving on a board of directors can be overwhelming – especially that first year or two. There’s a lot to learn, a lot to read, and plenty of pressure to understand everything right away. The work never truly ends. 

Board directors are expected to keep up with a slew of moving parts, keep in contact with stakeholders at all levels, and make the time to think through big challenges on the horizon long before action is required. Checking out for months at a time is not an option. Neither is showing up unprepared to a meeting, or delegating the important thinking. But at the same time, no one can be an expert on everything, all the time.

So what is a board director to do?

How to Discover Your Irreducible Minimum

We believe that there is an “Irreducible Minimum” that every board director should understand at all times. It’s a set of mission-critical gut check and a foundational understanding of the company you serve and your role on its board. In fact, we believe in this kind of board evaluation and effectiveness touch-point so strongly that we built it into Cloud Concinnity®, Click here to read more about how our smart platform automates this kind of evaluation, or here to learn more about our platform. 

To take a deep dive into how well you know your own “irreducible minimum”, work through the following series of topics and questions. Invite your fellow directors on the board to do the same. Compare answers and see what you learn — and see what that means for your company. 

1. How well do you know the company? 

• Can you explain what your company does and how it does it in a few sentences?

• What are a few of the key numbers that really help tell that story?

• Describe your company’s typical customer.

• What makes your company’s solution the best option for that customer?

• What is your company’s central strategy this year?

• What are a few key goals & landmarks along the way?

• What will it take to make or keep your company profitable?

2. How do you help?

• Is the board actively engaged in developing strategy or green lighting management’s plan?

• Which company goal are you playing a personal role in pushing forward?

• How are company and director progress measured?

3. How do you support all stakeholders? 

• Who are the company’s stakeholders, both major and minor?

• What are their goals for the company?

• How well is your company doing in meeting their needs?

• How does the company navigate conflicting stakeholder goals?

4. Do you participate in policy-making?

• What are the most important company policies to you?

• How are you taking part in the oversight of those policies?

5. How do you advise, support, and challenge management? 

• Can you name the senior leadership and their strengths & weaknesses?

• When was the last time your board had a fulsome executive session discussion about management performance?

• What area was a highlight and how did you recognize it?

• What area needed growth and how are you supporting that growth?

6. How do you contribute?

• How well do you prepare for board meetings on a scale of 1 – 10?

• What is the best question you’ve asked lately?

• When was the last time you and your board self-evaluated?

So, how did you do? Do you indeed know the irreducible minimum about your company? Do you feel good about your answers to these important questions? If yes, that’s great to hear. If not, it’s time to get caught up.

Click here to read more about how our smart platform automates this kind of evaluation, or here to learn more about our platform.  

How the Balanced Scorecard in Cloud Concinnity® Makes Your Board Better

Socrates famously advises us that the unexamined life is not worth living. 

We would add that the unexamined boardroom will not be worth much for long!

Measurement and data continue to be critical to business growth, yet the Harvard Business Review recently found that most boardroom evaluations are inadequate, and that those poor evaluation processes are often at the root of many common boardroom complaints. 

We recognize that there is a direct line from boardroom awareness and performance measurement to the growth & health of the business itself. It’s why we created a way to bring together key company metrics, boardroom performance visibility, and simple self-measurement capabilities so that board directors and all boardroom stakeholders can understand performance anytime, at a glance. 

We call it the balanced board scorecard.

Here’s why it makes Cloud Concinnity® a next-level software.

Visibility

Imagine nothing forgotten and everything measured. We think that should be the way things work, giving every board director visibility into all critical information on a single screen. We begin with things like a business milestone & highlight summary showing progress since the previous board meeting, then add on a financial status update chart and a brief overview of industry changes to keep track of. Combined with team engagement tracking and a personal task summary, this screen means you get the lay of the land within a minute or two of logging in every time. Nothing forgotten, everything measured.

Accountability

As HBR found in their survey, one of the biggest challenges for any board of directors is self-evaluation. After being largely ignored for decades, board evaluation and measurement has often been outsourced to consultants in recent years — often under the auspices of objectivity. But the wrong outside expert can lack the nuanced understanding and context required to make anything more than general suggestions for improved board performance. The truth is, boards benefit from taking a hard look at themselves and building intelligent, ongoing self-evaluation into their plans. 

The board scorecard contains an elegant process for doing that by quantifying & reinforcing board and leadership engagement, along with a way to track risk management, strategy, and company performance. Built-in 360° evaluations mean the board can manage and evaluate itself, laying important groundwork for transparency & accountability. 

Connectivity

Finally, bringing together the self-awareness of the single screen overview and the self-evaluation of the board scorecard means all boardroom stakeholders will increase connectivity, building the foundation for ongoing collaboration. Scorecard blocks are fully customizable so you can configure by priority and determine access with role-based permissions. As with other parts of Cloud Concinnity®, the goal is not to create busywork but to streamline processes between meetings and create a more agile, nimble group of board directors who can be proactive in the good times and responsive in a crisis. 

Interactive, real time evaluations of each other mean that all boardroom stakeholders can safely and securely weigh in on the state of the board without being sabotaged by the time-pressures and interpersonal dynamics at the meeting itself. This enables real time course correction throughout the quarterly board meeting cycle, and provides the legal team a secure environment with everything they need to prove compliance that is up to date and ready anytime.

Together, increased visibility, accountability and connectivity mean a boardroom that is always improving and ready for anything. In a business world where chaos is often the new normal, this is exactly the kind of agile tool that keeps boards ready to take action at any point in the cycle.

Why We Build Best Practices Into the DNA of Cloud Concinnity®

We believe that best practices are the backbone of truly great board work, and essential for agile leadership. They distill the most effective thinking and methodology into actionable insights, making anyone who applies their wisdom better at what they do. Indeed, what business can afford anything but best practices driven action amidst the chaos and confusion that characterizes the modern business era? 

When we looked around at the current generation of board portals, we couldn’t believe how little attention was paid to industry best practices. Maybe it’s because our founding team has well over 100 years of collective C-level and boardroom experience, so we are used to thinking in terms of best practices. Maybe it’s because our CEO literally wrote the book on the high performing boardroom so they are part of every conversation we have. Or maybe it’s just a natural outcome of focusing on our mission of providing new tools and playbooks to enable boards and c-suites to be agile in the face of the disruption and chaos that defines today’s business environment. 

Focusing on best practices makes our software better. Where board books & the current generation of board portals are basic tools that can help, we go the extra mile to craft intelligent software that never stops making the people using our software effortlessly better at what they do.

Here’s how.

1. We Begin with The End In Mind

Cloud Concinnity® is built around the interactions that leaders need to do great work, combining role-based document access with our next-level interaction functionality. All too often we see boards stumble over the challenges of communication and information access, when empowering stakeholders to do their part smoothly & efficiently as part of the larger whole should be table stakes. Because we prioritize fully informed decisions, we treat access to information and the smooth integration of that information into communication as a foundational best practice. 

We know that deep, broad, and integrated communication can be difficult to curate in the boardroom, so we build the best practices it takes into how our software function. Because different people need different levels of access to different types of information, we crafted a role-based information system that allows granular permissions. Because we know how important it is for everyone to stay on the same page every step of the way, we created a robust system of automated workflows & communication tools so everyone can work securely & up-to-date anytime, anywhere, on any device. Indeed, everything leaders need to make fully informed decisions is built in.

2. We Feature As-You-Go Guidance

We know that boardroom stakeholders — whether directors, company leadership, or private investors — are busy people. That’s why we build industry best practices into the DNA of our tool. Instead of having to hunt for the newest, best ways of doing things across a range of disciplines like finance, HR and compliance, we do the hunting and build the answers into the code of our software. When there is cutting-edge thinking on a process or challenge, we’ll tell you about it. When there is a better way to do a task or a series of tasks, we’ll show you how.

In practice, this means that when you log into Cloud Concinnity®, you’ll see suggestions from our founding team pop up alongside tasks, offering guidance on how to approach the type of tasks on your plate. You’ll find a smart library full of white papers and research that curate the best thinking out there so you will always be sharpening the spear. And you’ll find pre-built workflows for things like making new board director hires and preparing for compliance audits that lay out all the necessary steps for you so that nothing falls through the cracks. 

It’s because we think of best practices and better processes as integral to powerful, agile board work. They are not nice to have things that get tacked on when you have the time — they are integral parts of doing great work for your company.

3. We Architect Meaningful Feedback

The era of decisions without measurement is over. Without understanding outcomes and peer feedback, how can we know what’s working and how to improve? Decisions must be based on data. This kind of best practice is a challenge to build into the work of remote teams where a diverse set of stakeholders is typically on asynchronous schedules, and at the same time it is the only way to find that next level of high performance. 

We build meaningful feedback into Cloud Concinnity® in two main ways: a robust dashboard to reflect company performance and a 360° feedback tool. The dashboard means that key company metrics are available at a glance for every leadership stakeholder who logs in. Keeping tabs over time rather than simply checking in a few times a year allows for better communication and risk management, not to mention a valuable foundation for strategic vision. Our proprietary board scorecard is the first of its kind to eliminate the need for outside evaluation, opting instead to give the power to the board itself, encouraging honest and ongoing feedback based on agreed-upon metrics and objectives. Whatever initial discomfort may come along with the shift will soon give way to streamlined communication and team effectiveness. 

With evolving best practices at the core of what we do, we are committed to giving you software that empowers better decisions and agile leadership, and growing along with your team as those best practices change over time. 



How Automated Workflows Transform Board Work into Agile Leadership

We define agile leadership as choosing to operate as a proactive, adaptive leader in a changing world. For many of us, that is the opposite of how we would define the experience of board work. For decades, board work has revolved around the recurring but episodic march of the board book and the board meeting. In between, there was little to do for board directors but wait for the next meeting. 

Behind the scenes, board secretaries, committee chairs and administrative assistants often toiled away, laboriously collecting documents and research to include in the next board book. And there was always plenty of calling, emailing, begging and scrounging to get the documents needed and the long list of meetings scheduled. Everyone had their own method, and if some part of the process was forgotten, left undone or lost in the shuffle of positional turnover, it just meant more work for the new people to clean up the mess and rebuild the wheel. 

No more wasting time. 

Cloud Concinnity® makes things agile in a whole new way. Here’s how. 

Out-of-the-Box Workflows

Workflow automation saves businesses huge amounts of time and frustration by organizing repeated tasks into their ideal sequence, creating consistency and efficiency while minimizing or eliminating the chance for error. In board work, activities like overseeing compensation, choosing new board members, or ensuring regulatory compliance all require the integration of data, conversations, and deadlines to make fully informed decisions — all coordinated between people who are all working remotely and infrequently. The repeatable nature of these tasks makes them ripe for automated workflows, yet we do not see proper utilization of this technology in today’s generation of board portals. 

What we have done is create a suite of out-of-the-box workflows that automate common board tasks. For example, a board secretary who needs to assemble information for approval of release of earnings statements can gather all financial documents by simply pulling up the workflow and clicking “Start.” A pre-defined series of emails and alerts will go out to the relevant players, reminding them of what is needed, who needs it, and when it is due. Everyone is clear on everything and everyone has more time to make it happen. 

Custom Workflows

We understand that every board is different and has its own approach to doing things. That’s why in addition to out of the box workflows we give our administrators the power to create their own workflows. Whatever the series of tasks it takes to prepare for a key board activity or bring on the next board director, Cloud Concinnity® will help lighten the administrative load. 

For example, if your board is helping with the strategic planning for a business expansion and you want to gather feedback and gain consensus from an array of stakeholders along the way to approving elements of the expansion that gets reviewed by everyone on the board, you can easily create a workflow that alerts, reminds, and confirms that everyone has indeed seen and read the relevant information. Then and only then will the next steps initiate, making sure everyone is on the same page and contributing to a team-wide sense of urgency and action.

Best Practices

When there is a better way to do a task or a series of tasks, we’ll tell you. Because boards of directors face many shared regulations, they have many shared challenges. Unfortunately, there is a vacuum around the need for shared resources and best practices, and far too many boards are operating in the dark — and far below their capacity as a result. 

We add best practices to our dashboard so every time a director logs in they are getting fresh knowledge. We add best practices advice to our workflow-builder so that no matter who is doing the building (or the upkeep) on a workflow, it can be polished and tweaked to always improve. Finally, we make our library of best practices resources available for challenges like HR, financial planning, and cyber-risk so that board directors can focus on how they want to tackle those challenges, not on the hours of research it takes to understand the key pillars of the solution. 

How Cloud Concinnity® Powers Agile Leadership

Today’s leaders understand that the world is moving at a rocket pace and that day-to-day business world is much more chaotic today than it was even just five years ago. The rapid digital transformation, shifts in corporate culture, and a tumultuous political landscape all mean that leaders must be awake, aware, and ready to act at a moment’s notice.

We call that agile leadership: operating as a proactive, adaptive leader in a changing world.

Agile leadership requires agile tools. While we see some of these kinds of tools maturing (think Dropbox, G-Suite, or Zoom), we also see that boards of directors are too often stuck with yesterday’s tools, like bulky board books and clunky board portals.

We are focused on how Cloud Concinnity® can power agile leadership. Here are three examples.

ACCESS: Making Fully Informed Decisions

Harvard Business School recently outlined the importance of making fully informed decisions, using Netflix’s forward-thinking model of board communication as an example. The crux is finding a way for board directors to have access to all of the information they need, and the ability to talk to key people within the company to ask follow up questions or do further research. Surprisingly, this kind of access to information is not the norm for boards at too many companies, where information is siloed into the board book or left out-of-context in reports that don’t tell the whole story. This is why we prioritize access to both documents and people in Cloud Concinnity®. Fully informed decisions are the natural extension of the overall recognition that data-driven decision-making is the best way to improve & grow. Data-driven does not mean just numbers — it means context and intelligent analysis of as much information as possible. Gut instincts or deferring to the highest paid person in the room are not good enough anymore.

For the board to be as effective as it needs to be, we believe board members need to be able to access current documentation & information, past materials for context, and be easily able to get in touch with anyone at the company who can offer depth or perspective on any particular piece of data. Our smart library of documents is specifically designed to make all relevant information and context simple to find, and we prioritize access to each other and the company experts to make sure that when you have questions you can find answers. Only then can board directors arrive at a board meeting ready to make fully informed decisions.

PROCESS: Streamlining Communication & Management

We make processes seamless so agile leadership can thrive. Cloud Concinnity® guides boards through their often complex responsibilities, offering streamlined workflows so that boards stay effortlessly compliant and have more time to focus on important things, like strategy, performance and managing risk. Today, Cloud Concinnity® members have the option of subscribing to over 40 workflows containing over 400 tasks for the management of key board activities from Annual Meeting Management and Internal Audit Oversight to Role Clarity & Culture Management. And because board responsibilities are ever-evolving, so are Cloud Concinnity workflows.

These workflows save time, anxiety and risk for everyone involved. Designed by subject matter experts, these workflows push out tasks and alerts as needed to directors and management, giving the hours and hours general counsels, board chairs and committee chairs currently spend designing and managing board processes. Building best practices means continual improvement is built into board work, and having all key activities, dates and reports automated means teams know they won't forget things or be late -- everyone will be on top of what needs to happen. 

We support secure, documented and ongoing communication so that agile leadership is a habit and the team is practiced in making decisions and communicating — that way process is a foundation that supports agile work whenever it is needed.

OUTCOMES: Empowering Meaningful Measurement

Measuring company performance is the ultimate bottom line, so shouldn’t a board tool have a way to understand company performance at a glance? We think so, and we couldn’t understand why other board tools seem to not offer this. For us, understanding board performance starts with understanding company performance because agile leadership requires up-to-date, 24/7 measurement. The Cloud Concinnity® company dashboard does just that — any board director can get an accurate understanding of company performance anytime from anywhere. It’s a foundation for making agile decisions that make sense.

The next level of measurement for agile leaders is self-measurement. This has long been a challenge (and sometimes a sore spot) for boards, and something that often gets politely ignored or delegated to an outside expert. In either case, the board is passing on what can be a powerful opportunity for growth. Transparency, accountability, and self-measurement can be a powerful source of ongoing information if peer evaluation is built into the process of governing. To facilitate this, Cloud Concinnity® allows board directors to evaluate each other and the overall outcomes using the same software they use to do their work, creating an elegant board scorecard that quantifies progress toward self-defined board goals and easy access to peer review options. This balanced board scorecard reinforces leadership team engagement and means that every director can get an understanding of where the company and the board itself stands in relationship to the overall goals all in one place. We see it as a revolutionary approach to building a responsive & robust leadership team.

For agile leadership to work, leaders need agile tools, and it’s our passion to create a board intelligence & management platform that is as agile as the modern board needs to be.

Interested in how Cloud Concinnity can make a difference for your board? Get in touch.

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The Concinnity Company™ provides boards and c-suites with elegant technology and best practices. Cloud Concinnity® is the world’s first integrated board intelligence and management platform. 

Like what you’re reading? Subscribe to the Concinnity newsletter today. 

Why Your Board Portal Doesn’t Make You A Better Board Director

When board portals debuted a decade or more ago, the digitization of bulky board books was groundbreaking. Today, we are in an era where cross-device document sharing and digital collaboration tools are ubiquitous — except, it seems, in our corporate boardrooms. 

Board portals have done little to evolve beyond document storage, and where they are making updates, those changes are more patchwork and duct tape than transformation. More than a decade after bringing board work into the digital age, the available software is still lagging behind tools that the employees and leaders of the companies these boards advise take for granted in other aspects of their day to day work. 

They fall short in collaboration options, little or no guidance around common board work challenges, and thin options for accountability and measurement of board work overall. In short, board portals offer digital documents, but do little to help board directors do the actual board work, let alone get better at it or understand how effective what they are doing is in the big picture. To become a better board director, you need better software.

The World’s First Integrated Board Intelligence & Management Platform

This is why we call Cloud Concinnity® the world’s first integrated board intelligence and management platform. It is a platform, not a portal, offering a toolkit for board directors to perform and measure their work in new ways. We built a platform for board directors to stand on so they can focus on doing great work, not playing administrative catch up. 

1. ACCESS gets better with COMMUNICATION

We built our software around integrated communication. It’s not an add-on, it’s at the heart of the tool, tying activities to documents to calendars to messaging to meetings. Instead of scrambling the week before a meeting to do research, submit documents, and get questions answered, you’ll be part of an integrated board team. Occasional and automatically timed alerts will keep you on schedule (instead of scrambling at the last minute) and secure remote work options mean everyone you need to talk to is reachable inside the network. Bryan Stolle has an excellent Forbes article about what makes a great board member where he points to traits like judgment, wisdom, ad courage. Becoming a better board director is about putting these kinds of traits to use, not getting mired in administrative details.

2. PROCESS gets better with BEST PRACTICES

Running through the veins of our software is the Concinnity Framework, comprised of 10 Imperatives that drive High Performance for boards. This framework picks up where board portals leave off — we advise your members on how to use the information and network at their disposal to do better work. In addition to our framework, we include an ever-growing library of best practices around common board challenges like financial planning, human resources, and compliance standards. On top of that, we offer automated workflows that tie together sequential tasks, cutting down the administrative burden so more time and energy goes to strategy. We do it so that your energy goes to applying the best approaches to your specific situation rather than wondering if there is a better way to do things. Becoming a better board director is about refining your style, not starting from scratch every time.

3. OUTCOMES get better with MEASUREMENT

Whether it’s McKinsey or the Harvard Business Review, the experts know that outcomes get better when they are measured over time. And we all know it too. The problem isn’t getting on board with measurement, the problem has always been doing it in way that is reasonable rather than disruptive. That’s why we’ve designed features into our software that allow directors to more easily know important metrics and oversee achievements at a glance. We created a balanced board scorecard so that board directors can give feedback inside the same tool they do their work in, and we created measurement criteria that offer non-intrusive accountability. Becoming a better board director shouldn’t be a whole separate job, it should just be an integrated part of doing your work.

To become a better board director, you need better software, and we’ve made it our mission to give you just that. 

Interested in how Cloud Concinnity can make a difference for your board? Get in touch.

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The Concinnity Company™ provides boards and c-suites with elegant technology and best practices. Cloud Concinnity® is the world’s first integrated board intelligence and management platform. 

Like what you’re reading? Subscribe to the Concinnity newsletter today. 

Why Board Portals Don't Elevate Engagement

When a team of smart, savvy board directors put their heads and hearts together, there is nothing more powerful. Magic can happen and they can drive a company forward beyond expectations. 

But all too often, boards don’t communicate between meetings — or if they do, it’s sporadic and unanchored. They get stuck in first gear — always getting started, but not getting anywhere fast. 

To elevate board performance, boards must elevate engagement.

And no board can do that with a board portal.

• Board portals do one thing. Simply creating a digital version of the board book won’t get a board interacting — it will just give them one more account password to lose!

• Board portals go silent. We’ve all been on boards where it seems like everything ramps up a week before the meeting and stays hot for the week after. But in between the meetings, very little is happening.

• Board portals don’t evolve & grow. Your board grows, changes and builds on what has come before. Board portals are essentially static digital documents that mimic, but do not build on, what paper and basic word document programs already do.

The simple truth is that board portals will never elevate engagement because they are not designed to. 

ENGAGEMENT BEYOND THE BOARD MEETING

Boards don’t just need a portal, they need an intelligence & management platform. 

Cloud Concinnity® is just that — an integrated intelligence & management platform for boards who understand what it is going to take to up their game. We know board directors are under intense pressure from all sides. We designed this tool so they have a way to be consistently connected and elegantly efficient. 

And keep in mind: elevated engagement does not mean spend more time working. In our experience, episodic engagement that starts and stops around meetings ends up taking more time because everyone is playing asynchronous and unfocused catch up. Consistent, ongoing and informed engagement eliminates redundant relearning of the critical information, context and targets needed you need to be proactive and responsive.  Engagement is elevated in part because everyone develops that mental muscle memory and keeps it strong between meetings.

This is what a platform looks like when it is built for elevated engagement and higher performance:

ACCESS

Our platform is built around the idea of access to information — and each other — whenever and wherever it is needed. Where board portals simply hold documents, we make room for board directors to elevate their engagement through research and conversations by providing access to a smart library and a secure hub for messaging and conference calls.

PROCESS

In between meetings, directors benefit from our elegant network of automated workflows and alerts that keep everyone notified of next steps, elevating engagement and prompting board members well in advance to start important conversations and submit key documents. Everyone on the platform benefits from an evolving, growing best practices guidance feature where the tool itself helps coach board directors through tough transitions like on-boarding, crisis communication, and financial planning. Where board portals leave the process to you, we create a platform for growth.

OUTCOMES

Measurement is at the heart of elevated engagement, because in order to know what is working and what isn’t, we need to have baselines and consistent feedback. Board portals are silent on things like measurement, tracking and outcomes, we build them into the DNA of how our platform works. Rather than relying on outside experts, we make it possible for team members to self-evaluate and track progress on collective and company goals. What’s more, we provide a dashboard and balanced scorecard for next level transparency. 

We know that to elevate engagement you need a management & intelligence platform, not a portal — so we put the collective 100 years of experience on our leadership team together and built you the most powerful one available. 

Interested in how Cloud Concinnity can make a difference for your board? Get in touch.

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The Concinnity Company™ provides boards and c-suites with elegant technology and best practices. Cloud Concinnity® is the world’s first integrated board intelligence and management platform. 

Like what you’re reading? Subscribe to the Concinnity newsletter today. 

Why Your Board Portal Can't Solve Its Empty Box Problem

Digital transformation promises a better way of doing business. When leveraged to its full potential, technology can indeed make us more efficient, more productive, and give us more time to think about things like strategy and performance. This kind of transformation is long overdue in the modern boardroom. 

Unfortunately, the current crop of board portals falls short at every turn, proving to be little more than empty boxes. Board portals are simply not designed to integrate all the information, communication and activities that a board is responsible for. Long on promises but short on usability, they will forever suffer from the empty box problem of under-leveraging technology.

• Where board portals could leverage technology to support collaborative work, instead they leave collaboration opportunities empty and simply replicate the board book’s clunky collection of bulky information without much support for follow up questions, research, or deep analysis.

• Where board portals could support board directors in working smarter, they are conspicuously empty, acting more like over-priced document storage tools with digital versions of the same long to-do lists that already turn board work into a grind.  

• Where board portals could make outcome measurement easier, they are again empty, leaving board leaders to cobble together band-aids that will never be up to the task. 

There is a better way. 

BEYOND THE EMPTY BOX

Our leadership team has spent decades being part of leadership teams, sitting on boards, and advising business leaders on how to excel. We have won awards, published books, and built companies that are still thriving because of strategies we set in motion. We understand the problems that have hamstrung boards and leadership teams in the past, and we understand how to solve them. It will take a lot more than the empty box of today’s board portals.

When we built Cloud Concinnity®, we built it with the people who will use it in mind. It is better software designed for how board directors actually want to work, and for how they can work well together. Each member of our founding team has experience sitting on boards and being part of real businesses that have successfully grown. We built it to solve problems we have experienced and know how to solve.

This is what a full box looks like, with all of the information, board intelligence, best practices, task sequences and tracking systems ready to go from day one.

ACCESS

We pre-populate the platform with important information that every new member of the team needs to know to get up to speed quickly. If on-boarding has always been a bit of a challenge inside the boardroom and c-suite, prepare to be blown away. 

PROCESS

We built industry best practices, beginning with our own Concinnity Framework, right into the DNA of the software. As directors and management use the software, they’ll be guided through processes to get the most out of Cloud Concinnity®, and get educated on the best, most efficient way to meet compliance guidelines and tackle regulatory challenges. To top it off, the tool itself can coach you through communication, HR, and financial planning challenges that are all too often thorns in the side of a board.

OUTCOMES

Every team needs to measure its progress, as well as that of the company. But too often that measurement feels clunky to collect and tough to implement. For boards, that measurement likely comes from an outside expert who just hops in & out without proper context, adding another layer of challenge. Our customizable company dashboards and board scorecards enable your team to evaluate itself in real time, meaning everyone is always on track and moving in the same direction.

Interested in how Cloud Concinnity® can make a difference for your board? Get in touch.

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The Concinnity Company™ provides boards and c-suites with elegant technology and best practices. Cloud Concinnity® is the world’s first integrated board intelligence and management platform. 

Like what you’re reading? Subscribe to the Concinnity newsletter today.