On June 22, 2022, AmCham Germany had the privilege of hosting its first in-person Expert Briefing in its Frankfurt office since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In cooperation with Diligent, we welcomed a diverse group of AmCham Germany members in Frankfurt. Lisa Edwards, President & COO of Diligent and Member of the Board at Colgate-Palmolive, contributed her insights on the topic “Embracing the Modern Governance Paradigm.”
The tasks of corporate governance are becoming increasingly complex. Today, board members need a stronger and more diverse skillset than ever before, with topics ranging from Environmental, Social and Governanceto Cyber. Further needs include the monitoring and measuring of a company’s supply chains. Consequently, it seems high time to institutionalize a risk matrix and governance processes to deal with the challenges of our time.
Not a long time ago, most companies worked paper-based, with corporate governance being a highly manual process. Board members were taking their 500+ pages board books on a flight, creating all kinds of security issues. Today, digitalization is increasingly able to help overcome pitfalls of old procedures. With the help of technology-assisted audits that send warnings about critical transactions to high-risk suppliers, the possibilities are almost unlimited.
In the realm of this Expert Briefing, Diligent demonstrated to business leaders and decision makers how technology can help advance information and processes which are needed for good governance in today’s challenging business environment. Ms. Edwards elaborated on the question of how companies around the world are facing a governance-deficit, because they are either lacking access to the right information at the right time, the tools to guarantee the secure exchange of confidential data, or the multi-perspective view on issues their companies are facing. In a complex digital world, good corporate governance is a competitive advantage that not all companies are yet making full use of.
