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What is your first thought when someone says they’re a board member? Do you imagine a cold-faced person pulling all the strings at a company? Most people share that same perception, but the best way to understand what it’s like is to hear it first-hand. So on this episode, it’s our pleasure to welcome Deborah Elam, the President, and CEO of Corporate Playbook and Lucid Board member.
Deborah's career path is quite interesting. She started as an intern at GE and then joined one of their leadership development training programs. She spent the next 30 years at GE and was the first black female corporate officer in GE's history.
In today's episode of the Through Your Looking Glass podcast, Deborah and our host, Patrick, discuss the role of board members. As Deborah explains, board members are not executives. Their job is to give advice, present different points of view, and help managers implement the best strategy.
The two dedicate a considerable part of the conversation to diversity and why it’s so important to a company’s success. Having people with different lifestyles, beliefs, personal and professional backgrounds is the key to success no matter what industry you are in. "You don't want a bunch of 'Yes' people on your board," says Deborah and adds that allowing your team members to express themselves creates a healthy work environment everyone wants to be part of.
As we all know, if you want your business to prosper, you need to set an example because you want to be a company your community has confidence in. You want to attract as many clients or customers as possible, so you have to implement correct values and present them to the public.
