Australian Institute of Company Directors

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Boards often rely on plans and precision during times of uncertainty and change, which can counter-intuitively limit future choices. Cultivating an optionality mindset helps them stay flexible while maintaining governance discipline, writes Roger Chao FAICD. Shortly after the January 2026 Victorian fires, I was reminded just how quickly urgency could harden into false certainty with a board I chaired whose remit was to fund an array of emergency relief and recovery activities.

Overview After a period of falling oil prices and rising traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, the resumption of conflict in the Middle East is a reminder of the volatility that currently characterises the international economic environment. That volatility is in part a product of two ruptures. The geopolitical rupture identified by Mark Carney, of which the Iran war is an exemplar, and the technological rupture that is the current AI boom.

Executive summary Candidates who can demonstrate a clear understanding of governance and how it differs from management don’t necessarily need prior board experience. While technical expertise is important, its value is often overstated compared to the critical impact of emotional intelligence and commercial acumen. Great directors don’t dictate the work, they ask the right questions to help management find the answers. What’s preventing you from landing your first board role?

Executive summary Treating the law as a ceiling rather than a baseline exposes boards to severe reputational damage and value destruction. Modern governance requires directors to actively balance short-term shareholder returns with the ethical treatment of employees, supply chains and the broader community.

Executive summary Directors are shifting from accepting management’s word to actively demanding raw data to verify and stress test operational controls. Companies are increasingly decoupling audit and risk into separate committees to provide multiple checks against catastrophic operational failures. Distributed digital and AI competency across the entire board is now required to fulfill basic fiduciary oversight duties, rather than treating tech as a siloed IT item.

Executive summary With six in 10 leaders currently affected, chronic exhaustion has become a systemic boardroom reality. Leadership strain doesn’t stay contained at the top. A burnt-out executive acts as a contagion, actively eroding team morale, workplace culture and strategic focus. Burnout rarely happens overnight. It starts with unshakeable fatigue, morphs into toxic cynicism and ultimately guts operational performance. Most leaders don’t crash into burnout.

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Melbourne’s greatest competitive advantage may not be a harbour, a reef or a postcard landmark. It may be something harder to replicate – the city’s habit of showing up That point came through with some humour at the AICD Board and Melbourne Stakeholder Dinner, where the absence of natural icons was framed less as a limitation than as a strategic choice. As Janet Whiting AM observed, “The reality is that we don’t have a rock, a reef, or a harbour.

Against a backdrop of rising cost pressures, workforce constraints and rapid technological change, directors are being called to look beyond efficiency and focus on how their organisation creates sustained value or impact. Across government, the private sector and for purpose organisations, boards play a critical role in shaping the conditions for performance.