Report of the NACD Blue Ribbon Commission on Culture as a Corporate Asset

Click here to access a complimentary copy of the core report.

In Brief: Corporate culture can no longer be considered as a soft issue by management and boards. Its strength or weakness has a lasting impact on organizational performance and reputation. The oversight of culture must be a key board responsibility, as it is inextricably linked with strategy, CEO selection, and risk oversight. The NACD Blue Ribbon Commission Report on Culture as a Corporate Asset explores how boards can strengthen their oversight of corporate culture. The report provides 10 practical recommendations that boards can adopt to better assess the health of the corporate culture and use existing board responsibilities, such as executive compensation design and CEO evaluation, to drive the right behaviors. The report also includes a toolkit that provides sample documents, questions to inform discussion between the board and management, and other materials to support directors in implementing culture recommendations from the report.

This resource can help your board to

• make disclosures about culture oversight;
• write a director code of conduct;
• determine the general counsel’s role in supporting culture;
• build a dashboard for culture oversight;
• create an employee culture survey; and
• support culture through compensation, recognition, and reward systems.

Most relevant audiences: directors of public, private, and nonprofit organizations; nominating and governance committee members; compensation committee members; CEOs; and management teams