Many boards sense that something is missing. An acquisition may be on the horizon, the business may be entering a new market, or a long-serving director may be preparing to step down. The instinct is to start looking for a name.
The better first step is to agree on the mission, map the skills each director brings, and identify what is missing before the search begins.
This article explains what a board's North Star looks like in practice, and how a skills matrix turns good intentions into confident, fact-based decisions.
Why Every Board Needs a North Star
Every board needs a North Star to look to for guidance, and for many, that is the skills matrix. A skills matrix keeps that direction practical, showing whether the board has the capabilities it needs to get there.
A clear North Star also protects the working relationship between the board and the CEO. The board governs: it sets direction, oversees risk, and holds the organization accountable. Management operates. When both sides understand their mandate, conversations stay constructive, and directors can add value without stepping into day-to-day operations.
Partner, Pender & Howe
„A board will drift without a North Star - a skills matrix. The skills matrix identifies the “superpowers” each board director contributes to the board. It shows, in plain terms, who is at the table, what each director brings, and what critical experience set is missing.“
Glenn Lesko
The Board as a Quilt
Think of a board as a quilt. A quilt is made of individual fabric patches, and together they create the whole.
A board works the same way: each director brings unique capabilities - their superpowers - and together they form a strong, functional board.
Building the Skills Matrix
A strong matrix identifies board directors' unique capabilities. Boards often default to familiar experience definers such as a finance expert, a lawyer, or HR expertise. Titles are a useful starting point, but capabilities are what a board actually draws on.
Four steps keep the process practical:
- Start with the North Star and agree on the key capabilities the board relies on for exceptional governance. These might include a background in finance, human resources, expertise in law or risk assessment, or mission fidelity.
- Define the capabilities required, including emerging ones such as AI and cybersecurity, along with breadth of experience and perspective.
- Ask each director for a candid self-assessment against those capabilities.
- Review the results together and read them as a story about where expertise is well represented, where gaps remain, and where several directors cover the same ground.
A well-tuned matrix is key to understanding which skill areas the current board underrepresents.
The self-assessment deserves care. Directors are senior and accomplished, and the exercise works best when it feels comfortable and useful rather than evaluative. Framed as a shared look at the table, not a verdict on any individual, it invites a more honest conversation about renewal and succession.
Beyond the Technical Skills
A matrix captures what directors' capabilities are. As boards navigate faster change, from new technology to evolving expectations of governance, equally important is how they approach decisions.
Several stand out. Critical thinking tests assumptions and asks what the evidence shows. Curiosity keeps a director learning in areas they do not yet know well. Sound judgment weighs competing views before a decision is made. The ability to listen, and then challenge constructively, keeps debate productive. Adaptability helps when the plan changes, and humility makes it easier to say "I don't know" in a room full of experienced people.
These skills are harder to rate than financial oversight or cybersecurity, but they are just as real. In a search for new board directors, these softer skills come through in conversation, in references, and in how a candidate talks about experience. Expertise gets a candidate to the shortlist. Behaviours often decide whether the board and a new director thrive together.
From Matrix to Capability-Based Recruitment
Once the matrix shows where the gaps are, the board knows what important skills are needed to fill those gaps. This shapes the search direction for the right director. It also gives the board a consistent yardstick for assessing candidates, which replaces gut feel and familiar networks with evidence.
"Capability-based recruitment ensures skills congruency between the board and the candidate. When a search starts from the matrix, we compare real skills with real needs." - Travis Hann: Founder & Managing Partner, Pender & Howe
The same yardstick helps a board recognize a poor fit early, before an appointment is made. A candidate may be impressive yet bring strengths the board already has. Seeing that clearly, and discussing it respectfully, serves everyone involved.
Where Pender & Howe Fits
At Pender & Howe, our approach to building a high-performing board starts with an understanding of the current board and the skills each director brings. A thorough board search is a relationship, not a transaction. We work with the board from the first conversation to the final appointment. Along the way, we assess every candidate against the same North Star.
Board search is recruitment: finding and attracting the right directors for the seats that need filling. Board advisory goes deeper. It is embedded in a board's strategy and succession planning, and it rests on trust built over time. A skills matrix supports both, giving a search a clear brief and giving an advisory relationship a clear picture of where the board is heading.
If your board has not yet built an up-to-date matrix, or has one that no longer reflects where the business is going, we would be glad to start that conversation with you.
Start Your North Star Conversation Here
With offices across Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Boston, and New York, Pender & Howe combines boutique-level partner involvement with deep sector intelligence across technology, life sciences, industrial, consumer goods, and professional services.