The impact of the board on strategy: An empirical examination

Boards of directors are coming under increasing scrutiny, both in the wake of a number of serious corporate frauds and failures and through a more gen eral debate about the nature of corporate governance and its role in achiev ing national competitiveness. Though research on boards is growing, there r emains a lack of empirical studies on the perceptions of directors themselv es as to their role and influence in the running of organizations, and in p articular the strategic process. This article responds to widespread calls for direct study of boards of dir ectors by using a multi-method approach involving an in-depth examination o f 51 directors of UK public companies, a survey of 121 company secretaries and four case studies of UK plcs, where multiple hoard members were intervi ewed. Through the use of a grounded methodology, this article examines the impact of boards on strategy and shows that by establishing the business de finition, gatekeeping, selecting directors, and confidence building, the bo ard influences the boundaries of strategic action. Evidence for the manager ial domination off boards was slight, but the results showed support for a number of theoretical frameworks, suggesting that multiple perspectives are required to fully understand the nature of board activity.