Board Intelligence

The 2026 GCC Board Gender Index has just been published. It is the only research of its kind offering an in-depth analysis of women's representation on publicly listed boards across the region. The research is conducted by Heriot-Watt University, Dubai Campus and supported by Board Intelligence. On 29 April at 13:00 GST, join four leaders live to explore what the data shows: - Professor Dame Heather McGregor, Provost and Vice Principal of Heriot-Watt University Dubai - Sreekumar Brahmanandan, Investment Director, Dubai Investment Industries - Annette Bak Kirby MSc PCC, Boardroom Executive Coach, INSEAD Executive Education - Sally Yousif, Director of Middle East, Board Intelligence The conversation will cover how 2026 compares to previous years, what is driving progress in the region, and what stronger female representation means for board effectiveness. Register via the link in the comments.

Board papers landed on a Friday night and no time to read the headlines? Let us help you start your week knowing what matters. What Matters on Monday is the newsletter for board members and senior leaders. We send you all the key headlines, governance trends and research-backed insights of the last 7 days. All in your inbox before you open your laptop. Start your week with us, and start it right. Sign up for free: https://bit.ly/4sdjst2

Only 23% of directors believe their board is operating at its full potential. Nearly a third say their board adds no value at all. That is what we found in our own Board Value Index, and what our CEO Pippa Begg spoke about on CNBC Squawk Box Europe earlier this week. The problem is not talent. Boards are under-resourced, stuck reviewing backwards-looking information, and rarely getting enough on strategy or the external environment to make the decisions that matter most. Our AI sparring partner changes that. It is built on 20 years of boardroom expertise, optimised across 130-plus topics and 80-plus skills and capabilities, with secure hosting, data retention in your control, no machine learning on your data, and strict permissions and information rights throughout. Boards are capable of far more than most are delivering. We are here to close that gap. See how we are building AI for the boardroom: https://bit.ly/4vQEdOA

Most PE boards say they want to focus on strategy, but most spend the majority of their time on past performance. Last week, our CEO Pippa Begg joined Joe Berwick and the PepTalks community for a Chair Forum exploring why that gap persists, and what the best PE-backed Chairs do differently. The session covered agenda discipline, what good board papers look like in a PE context, and how AI is changing both the investment thesis and how boards prepare to make decisions. If your board is data-rich but insight-poor, it's worth asking whether the problem is structural. Read our latest research on board effectiveness to find out what's holding boards back: https://bit.ly/3OR57VI

The boards governing AI most effectively tend to share four characteristics. They build individual capability before designing governance structures. They demand AI-specific insight from management, not just general technology updates. They integrate AI into existing frameworks rather than building new ones in parallel. And their directors use AI tools themselves. That last point matters more than it might seem. Directors who experiment with AI tend to engage with AI governance questions more effectively. You cannot ask smart questions about something you have never encountered. Our Board AI Readiness Radar has assessed 31 organisations across 11 countries. The data shows a significant gap between board awareness and board preparedness — but also that the boards that have started the journey are making measurable progress. Find out where your board stands. The Radar is free and takes less than ten minutes. https://bit.ly/4lFtH87

Our CEO Pippa Begg was on CNBC Squawk Box Europe this week with Ian King and Ben Boulos, talking about what it looks like when AI enters the boardroom. Board directors are expected to be experts across 130-plus topics and 80-plus skills and capabilities. Most have no team to help them. And most of what lands in their inbox looks backwards, not forwards. What changes that, as Pippa put it on air, is our AI sparring partner, which is optimised across the 130-plus topics and 80-plus skills and capabilities a board member needs. It surfaces what is in the pack, and helps you explore what is behind it, and what is beyond it. The human still takes the decision. Our AI sparring partner ensures they can explore more questions, more deeply, to inform their judgement, with secure hosting, data retention in your control, no machine learning on your data, and strict permissions and information rights throughout. Watch the full interview here: https://cnb.cx/4sMupSV

AI is already in the boardroom. Just not in the way most governance frameworks anticipated. Our Board AI Readiness Radar finds that fewer than 10% of boards are proactively using new technologies to improve how they work. Meanwhile, many directors are experimenting with AI individually, using generic tools that were never designed for board-level information. Our CEO Pippa Begg writes about this gap in Management Today and what it means for boards that are serious about governing AI well. Read the full article: https://bit.ly/3QSnASh

Boards can't govern what they can't see. Early data from our Board AI Readiness Radar shows that Information is the lowest-scoring pillar of board AI readiness, averaging just 1.7 out of 6. Across three questions about whether boards have the right information to oversee AI decisions, whether they're measuring the right things, and whether they're looking outward at AI developments, the most common answer is zero. This sits on top of a broader problem. Seven years of joint research with the The Chartered Governance Institute shows that board reporting quality has barely improved despite rising expectations. Layering AI oversight onto reporting infrastructure that was already struggling is a significant ask. Company secretaries and governance professionals have a critical role here. What gets onto the agenda, and in what form, shapes what the board can see and act on. On 12 May, we're unpacking these early findings with Apex Group Ltd. Register to join Dr Scarlett Brown and Suzi Beese. https://bit.ly/4vexygv

How do boards lead transformation, rather than simply react to it? That's the question at the heart of the Danish Board Conference 2026, hosted by Board Network - The Danish Professional Directors Association in Copenhagen on 27 April. This year's theme, "Leading Transformations", puts boards at the centre of change across culture, strategy, and technology. Among the speakers is Ann Hiatt, Chair of Board Intelligence and former Chief of Staff to Jeff Bezos at Amazon and Eric Schmidt at Google. Helle Bank Jørgensen, GCB.D, NACD.DC, Global Managing Director of Board Development at Board Intelligence, will be attending alongside Jonas Lauritz Galle and Aleksander Liss from TeamEngine. If you're attending, we'd encourage you to book time with them ahead of the conference.

Our CEO Pippa Begg was on CNBC Squawk Box Europe this morning with Ian King and Ben Boulos. The conversation: what it looks like when AI enters the boardroom. Boards are expected to be experts across a vast array of topics and to have a wide breadth of skills. Most directors have no team or resource behind them and suffer from information asymmetry with the organisation. That is the problem our AI is built to solve. Our AI is optimised across every one of those 130-plus topics and 80-plus skills boards need to be expert in. It acts as a sparring partner, helping directors better prepare for their board meetings by enabling broader lines of enquiry and surfacing information more rapidly than before. And deployed with the security that boardrooms demand: the highest info sec requirements, data retention in your control, no machine learning on your data, and sophisticated access controls so that only those that should see information can. Watch the full interview here: https://cnb.cx/3OpSsJf