This document summarizes the launch of the 2024 ASEAN Board Trends Report and the ASEAN Directors Registry, with emphasis on improving board effectiveness, strengthening board–management dynamics, and advancing ESG and future-readiness.
Context and purpose
The “ICDM Advocacy Dialogue” (22 Feb 2024) is framed as an ASEAN-wide collaboration under the ASEAN IOD Network to enhance director professionalism, elevate board effectiveness, and strengthen corporate governance across the region. The material also introduces the ASEAN Directors Registry as a platform intended to support cross-border board talent needs.
Respondent profile and outlook
The survey covers 9 countries and 335 responses, representing both board members and management across multiple industries (e.g., financial services, consumer products & services, industrial products & services, and technology). Results indicate respondents are more optimistic about longer-term growth (3–5 years) than the near-term (next 2 years).
Key findings: agenda, roles, and dynamics
Top perceived threats over the next two years cluster around: talent and leadership availability, macro/geopolitical uncertainty, and sustainable operating challenges such as financing/cost pressures, changing customer demand, and supply-chain/technology/energy disruptions. Strategic priorities for the next two years lean toward improving internal operations (business model improvement, efficiency, data-driven supply chain/process management, and risk/BCP reassessment), alongside expansion and innovation, “real” sustainability integration, and stronger people/talent strategies.
Board effectiveness and sustainability readiness
Board self-assessments tend to be more positive than management’s ratings on areas such as the board’s contribution to decision quality and having the right skills mix for the next 3–5 years. On sustainability, management expresses lower confidence in board ESG capability, with recurring oversight challenges including board ESG capacity-building, linking ESG to strategy and KPIs, and strengthening governance structures (e.g., assigning oversight to committees or creating dedicated ESG/sustainability committees).
Key themes and recommended actions
Five themes for 2024 and beyond are highlighted: resetting board priorities and agenda, improving board–management relationship dynamics, evolving board architecture and culture to be more progressive and forward-looking, conducting a “stocktake” of board effectiveness, and closing the gap between sustainability theory and practice. Suggested next actions include formal board effectiveness evaluations, periodic reviews of board composition and remuneration, clarifying board–management dynamics, revisiting materiality and key risk matrices, focusing on talent governance and culture, and setting credible sustainability targets (explicitly discouraging greenwashing).