I hate board meetings. I probably have 100 per year which means I’ve gone to well over 1,500 of the past 15 years (I’m sure the number is much higher). The vast majority are excruciatingly inefficient – three to four hours that could be handled in 45 minutes. And even then, it’s unclear that the […]

I find three hour “reporting board meetings” where everyone sits around and goes through a 50 page PowerPoint deck to be tedious. When I first started investing in 1994, this was the norm. I put up with it even though it wasn’t my style because (a) I didn’t know better and (b) I didn’t have […]

My amazing day at the Supreme Court continued to bounce around in the back of my mind all day yesterday.  I was at a board meeting for a company that I’ve been on the board of for almost a decade – it was the best (as in most productive) board meeting we’ve had in a […]

There was plenty of chatter about my post The Best Board Meetings.  One idea popped up a few times and was well articulated by John Boyd in his post What Makes a Good Board Meeting?  In it he talks about what is expected from a VC in a board meeting, rather than just from the […]

Over the past 15 years I’ve been to thousands of board meetings.  Last week I had four; this week I have two.  I’ve spent a lot of time – often during board meetings – thinking about how to make them better and more effective. Yesterday, Fred Wilson (who was at the Return Path board meeting […]

At the end of every board meeting I’m a part of we have a closed session.  This is a session that includes only the board members.  All of the boards I’m on include the CEO as a board member so the CEO is part of the closed session.  If there are multiple founder / management […]

Will Herman has an excellent post up titled Board Meetings – A CEO’s Point of View.  While I’ve never been on a board where Will was CEO, he and I have been on several boards together, and he’s an incredibly valuable and impactful board member.  His “top 11” list of suggestions is a must read for […]

I go to a lot of board meetings.  As a result, I’ve reviewed a lot of board meeting minutes.  In general, the philosophy among most VC-backed companies – promulgated by the law firms for these companies – is to keep the board minutes “light.”  They should cover the substance of the meeting and have any […]