Sharpen Your Director's Focus

In our recent Savvy Director blog post, Focus on What Matters, I wrote about the importance of boards staying focused on mission-critical issues. With the flood of board materials, it’s easy to get lost in the weeds. Board meetings are filled with reports, updates, and discussions. As directors we have to be able to distinguish what’s truly important (the signal) from the massive volume of less strategic information (the noise).

A simple framework that we call The Director’s Focus can help cut through complexity and zero in on what matters most. Using this framework involves viewing board material through four lenses: strategy, people, finance, and risk.

Being a savvy director involves asking questions, interpreting information, and contributing to good board decisions that steer the organization in the right direction. When you know not only what to focus on, but also how best to review it, you’re able to elevate your oversight, sharpen your questions, and contribute meaningfully to boardroom dialogue.

Four Lenses for Lasting Impact

The Director’s Focus is more of a mindset than a checklist. It’s about cultivating disciplined curiosity and structured thinking. Whether you’re a seasoned director or you’re new to the boardroom, looking at board material through four different lenses – strategy, people, finance, and risk – will round out your thinking and help you navigate complex issues.

Some material that comes to the board fits easily with one lens or another. It makes sense to view the Financial Statements through the finance lens, the HR report through the people lens, and so on.

But if that’s all you’re doing, you’re missing the opportunity of the four lenses framework. By deliberately choosing to apply different lenses, you’ll find yourself taking a more holistic view, being able to spot troubling inconsistencies, and identifying areas that need more exploration or clarification. It will also keep you working at a more strategic level.

If you’re like most people, you have a way of considering issues that’s comfortable and feels natural to you. Your personality traits, your education and training, and your experience have all contributed to that way of viewing the world. As a result, you tend to default to one of the four lenses. If you’re an accountant, you view items through a financial lens. If you’re an HR professional, the people lens will be most comfortable. You get the picture.

To have lasting impact on your board’s decision-making and strengthen your reputation as a savvy director, it pays to step out of your comfort zone and view management reports and proposals in ways that are a bit more of a stretch for you. That’s where the Director’s Focus comes in.

The Director's Focus Framework

Let’s explore each of the four lenses in turn.

The Strategy Lens

Strategy defines how an organization chooses to go about achieving its goals. Even if management creates the strategy, the board still approves it. That means directors must understand the strategy well enough to challenge assumptions, assess risks, offer advice, influence direction, and be confident the strategic plan is sound.

Directors should constantly assess whether the information that management presents supports, challenges, or distracts from the strategic direction. Every board document should be read with the overarching question in mind: “Does this align with our strategy?”

It’s important to be alert to strategic drift, too. Sometimes, a well-intentioned project – or the need to chase funding from investors or donors – pulls the organization off course. Reviewing material through the strategy lens helps you spot these deviations early.

No strategy is set in stone. When there are significant changes within the organization or in the external environment, adjustments to the strategic plan may be called for. Reviewing material through the strategy lens helps the board “see around corners” to spot the need for a shift in strategy.

The strategy lens helps ensure board decisions align with the organization’s long-term vision, mission, and priorities, and keeps the board avoid from being too operational – focusing on value creation and strategic alignment instead.

Here are a few good questions to help you view a proposal through a strategy lens:

• How does this proposal align with our strategic priorities?
• How does it advance our mission or long-term goals?
• What long-term outcomes will it deliver and how will we measure them?
• How does it position us relative to our competitors or industry trends?
• What are the opportunity costs – what might we have to delay, reduce, or stop?
• How does it leverage our strengths and address our weaknesses?
• If we were starting fresh today, would it be among our top three strategic initiatives?

The People Lens

Organizations don’t succeed just because they have a great strategic plan. They succeed because of people. The people lens reminds us that behind every chart or metric is a team, a leader, or a community.

Savvy directors pay close attention to the human dimension including leadership, talent, organizational culture, and stakeholder relations. People issues often show up subtly in board materials: through turnover rates, engagement scores, or leadership transitions. Directors who read between the lines can spot early signs of dysfunction or opportunity.

The people lens is focused on understanding the impact on all stakeholders – not just employees, but also customers, owners, partners, funders, suppliers, and community members. The people perspective ensures that decisions consider the human factors that can make or break the success of an initiative.

Here are a few questions to help you view a proposal through a people lens:

• How will this initiative impact our relationships with key stakeholders? How will we communicate it?
• How will it affect employee engagement, morale, and retention?
• How does it align with our organizational values and culture?
• Do we have the right leadership in place to execute it?
• What skills or capacity are required from our people to deliver it successfully?
• How will we attract, retain, and develop the talent we need to execute it?
• What potential resistance or opposition might arise? How will we address it?

The Finance Lens

Financial oversight isn’t just about balance sheets and budgets. Savvy directors know that the financial statements tell a story. They use the numbers to assess whether the organization has the resources to execute its strategy, absorb risks, and invest in its people.

The finance lens focuses your attention on trends, assumptions, and forecasts that can reveal deeper truths about organizational momentum or stagnation. It’s not just about cost, but about value creation, return on investment, funding sources, and long-term financial implications.

Looking through the finance lens helps you come to grips with the viability, sustainability, and impact of a proposed initiative on the organization’s overall health.

Here are some questions to help view a proposal through a financial lens:

• What are the direct, indirect, and total costs?
• What are the expected financial benefits? Over what time frame?
• What assumptions underlie the projections? How sensitive are they to change?
• How will the proposal be funded? What are the implications for our cash flow and reserves?
• What are the opportunity costs? What other investments will we have to defer or cancel if we go ahead?
• How will it impact our ability to respond to unexpected challenges?
• What’s the worst-case scenario? Could we absorb it without jeopardizing other priorities?

The Risk Lens

Risk management isn’t just about avoiding danger – it’s about acknowledging and preparing for uncertainty, or pursuing an opportunity with some risk attached. As stewards of organizational resilience, it’s important for directors to understand the risk-return trade-off and ensure the organization has the capacity to manage risks effectively.

It’s natural to focus on the risks of taking action, but the risks of sticking with the status quo can be just as consequential. Ignoring a trend, delaying a decision, or clinging to outdated practices can quietly erode competitiveness or credibility. Savvy directors consider both sides of the risk equation.

Looking through the risk lens, your focus shifts to identifying, understanding, and addressing potential threats and vulnerabilities that could impact the organization’s strategic objectives, operations, or reputation.

Here are a few questions to help you review a proposal through a risk lens:

• What are the initiative’s key risks? How likely are they and what’s the potential impact?
• How will we mitigate the risks?
• Are we prepared to accept the residual risk that remains after mitigation?
• If a key risk materializes, what’s the contingency plan?
• How will we spot and respond to new and emerging risks?
• Was the plan stress-tested under a worst-case scenario?
• What if we don’t go ahead? What are the risks of inaction?

Putting It All Together

Imagine your board is reviewing a proposal to formalize the organization’s work model – choosing between remote, in-office, or hybrid arrangements. The materials include employee survey data, productivity metrics, cost analyses, and cultural impact assessments.

Applying the four lenses to this important decision would help the board move beyond surface-level approval. Directors would engage in a robust, multidimensional discussion, challenging assumptions, uncovering blind spots, and ultimately moving forward to make a more informed decision.

Their discussion might look something like this:

• The strategy lens: How does the proposed model support our strategic goals? Does it enhance innovation, collaboration, or market reach?
• The people lens: How do employees feel about the options? Will the model support inclusion, flexibility, and well-being? Are leaders equipped to manage in the chosen environment?
• The finance lens: What are the cost implications – real estate, technology, travel? Are we investing wisely to support the chosen model?
• The risk lens: What are the risks of each model – cybersecurity, talent retention, compliance, or cultural erosion? And what are the risks of not making a decision – such as employee disengagement or reputational damage?

Closing Thoughts: Focus as a Discipline

A board of directors is more than just a ceremonial overseer. Directors are strategic partners, risk sentinels, culture stewards, and financial guardians. Hopefully, the Director’s Focus framework equips you to play all those roles.

Keep in mind that there’s a benefit to your personal brand to ask questions or add insight in areas outside your primary discipline. So, the next time you open your board package, ask yourself, “What lens am I looking through? What am I missing?” That simple act of reframing can magnify your impact in the boardroom.

Want to go deeper? Download DirectorPrep’s free e-book: The Director’s Focus: Where to Spend Your Time and Energy.

All the sample questions in this post were generated with the help of DirectorPrep’s AI tool, ChatDPQ. Why not try ChatDPQ to prepare for your next board meeting?

Your takeaways:

• The Director’s Focus is a simple framework to help you cultivate disciplined curiosity and structured thinking in the boardroom. It involves viewing board material through four distinct lenses.
• The strategy lens: read every board document with one overarching question in mind: Does this align with our strategy?
• The people lens: Pay close attention to the human dimension of every issue you’re faced with.
• The finance lens: assess whether the organization has the resources to execute its strategy, absorb risks, and invest in its people
• The risk lens: be aware of potential threats to the organization’s resilience.

Resources:

• What is the board’s role regarding strategy? Dan Byrne. © 2025 Corporate Governance Institute.
• The role of the board when managing risk. Dan Byrne. © 2025 Corporate Governance Institute.
• Financial literacy for directors: Key concepts for effective governance. Dan Byrne. © 2025 Corporate Governance Institute.
• The Board’s Expanding Role in Leading Human Capital Sustainability. Ramesh Nuggihalli. Directors & Boards. May 2025.
• Connecting Customer Experience and Human Capital Strategy. Alisa Coren Norris and Jessica Saperstein. Directors & Boards. August 2025.

Thank you.

Scott

Scott Baldwin is a certified corporate director (ICD.D) and co-founder of DirectorPrep.com – an online membership with practical tools for board directors who choose a learning and growth mindset.

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