Contemporary boards face increasing scrutiny; answers do not come from more spreadsheets and workplans but from genuine reflection on the behaviours and attitudes of those systems and people surrounding the board. The Tavistock Institute’s Dynamics at Board Level programme offers a space to experience and learn about the boardroom as a container for the forces that effect total enterprise, whatever its size, shape or scope. 

Systems of organisation and authorisation sit at the heart of boardroom functioning and are primarily matters of equity and inclusion. The impact of race, gender and class are profoundly difficult to face and work through in the boardroom, displaced by anxiety about the demands of stakeholder and broader governance dynamics. Boardrooms need skilled individuals and teams that are able to operate in the ‘pressure cooker’ of the contemporary boardroom. Increasing regulatory responses, corporate governance codes and assurance frameworks have not been sufficient to avert the disasters or mitigate the risks associated to ‘human factors’.

Equally, boards in the public and third sectors face more challenges around collaborating in competitive hyper-turbulent marketplaces, including the unending demands of fiscal austerity, and the operational requirements of mergers and partnerships. When we speak of boards we usually have in mind the boards of large organisations but there are boards and senior leadership teams in every sector, each with their own unique sets of roles and responsibilities. 

This Tavistock Institute programme is the gold-standard to study, in real-time, the dynamics that shape our contemporary boards. As an organisation, the Tavistock Institute addresses leadership development through the exploration of individual, group and systemic dynamics (of which no groups are ever fully aware and are never fully free from their influence). The Tavistock Institute offers chairs and members of boards, trainers, evaluators ‚consultants and coaches working in board development, access to a unique depth of knowledge and practice that comes from advising those in positions of power and authority for over 75 years.

Who is this programme for? 

Certificate in Dynamics at Board Level is a certified programme for those sitting on or working with Boards. This could include Chairs of Boards, Board members, Executive Directors, trainers, evaluators, consultants, coaches and others working in board evaluation and governance development. This may also include senior leaders and managers who find themselves regularly consulting to executive committees, trustees and shareholders. 

The programme is designed for those boards seeking help to diagnose, evaluate and remedy blind spots, basic assumptions and dysfunctional anxieties before they grow into insurmountable problems. After the programme, participants will be able to help their boards explore resistance-to change, dynamics that can affect strategy setting, succession planning and remuneration levels.

The value of taking Certificate in Dynamics at Board Level 

The programme is based on well-established Tavistock Institute approaches – addressing the unconscious, working with whole- system dynamics and experience-based learning.

This ensures that what you learn is not just words and theories but creates an integrated programme that addresses both the practical demands and underlying group dynamics of a board. Your learning is drawn out of you, rather than having other people’s ideas fed into you. Above all, this programme is about accessing the courage to say what other’s fear to say in the boardroom (or at least understand why collusions of silence continue).

Participants will have deeper appreciation and insights into board dynamics, leadership and development. You will have access to, and be challenged to embody the knowledge and experience of the Tavistock Institute’s leadership development approaches of the last six decades.

You can expect to come away from the programme with an increased understanding of how to:

• Expand your board leadership, board membership, teaching, evaluation and consulting capability in ways that help boards to identify their primary task;
• Manage the tensions between the content of boards working agendas and the underlying pull towards less efficient functioning;
• Evaluate individual member performance;
• Support Chairs;
• Fill skills gaps and create healthily diverse boards;
• Assist boards in managing their external relationships with stakeholders, executive teams and the rest of the organisation.

With a small group of participants, you will get the time and space to focus on how people and professions that lead, participate in, evaluate and support boards take up their own evaluation and facilitation roles to improve and develop boards and the roles of its directors, whether executive or non-executive. The programme offers theoretical and practical wisdom on themes including leadership, complexity and board functioning and making use of political skills for improving board effectiveness. 

Action Learning Sets embed the knowledge and create space to test them in daily work. An online private forum —Basecamp — is available for the use of the participants between modules and additionally, there will be opportunities for post-programme work at the Tavistock Institute — one-to-one or group support.

Programme Outline

The programme is formed of 4 × 2-day modules, with the first module being held residentially at the Moller Institute in Cambridge. Subsequent modules are held at the Tavistock Institue’s London office. 

Group dynamics and unconscious processes are key themes addressed in each module of the programme. Systems-psychodynamic perspectives inform each module.

Module #1, Residential with venue TBC 

• Building the Board Team
• Considering the Committee Structure 
• Learning Strategy and outcomes

Module #2

• Thinking about succession
• Complexity and Strategy challenges
• Consultant as barometer (What about ‘feelings as barometer’?)

Module #3

• Integrated Reporting
• Board Evaluation
• Power and Politics

Module #4

• Annual Reporting
• Peer Review
• Case study materials

Programme directors

Visiting faculty will be announced before modules. 

Venue

Module 1 will be residential with venue to be confirmed. The venue will be UK based within easy travel distance of major UK airports. 

Subsequent modules, modules 2 - 4, will take place at the Institute offices in London. Situated between Farringdon, Barbican and Old Street, we moved into our office at Gee Street in mid-2021. Our office is a bright and flexible space, with a state-of-the-art video conference system set up to accommodate both in-person and online learning, and in hybrid. We have a fully stocked kitchen, board room, consulting rooms and studio space for larger groups and movement. Please note, these modules are non-residential and participants will be responsible for their accommodation / meals. 

Assessment

To apply for certification from the Tavistock Institute participants will need to attend all four modules in full and submit two assessed pieces of work, a learning log and an academic standard paper, which must demonstrate your internalisation and integration of the concepts and ideas encountered in the programme and how these manifest or have changed your actual practices.

Next Steps

To join this programme please complete the online application form and pay the deposit. If you have any questions and/or would like a conversation about the programme with one of the directors, please contact Meg Davies, Professional Development Manager at: m.davies@tavinstitute.org