Your board effectiveness roadmap

Our Board Effectiveness Survey is built on the internationally recognised WhatWhoHowDo Framework, a model designed to assess how boards function in practice — not just in theory.

In early 2020, the framework underwent comprehensive refinement in collaboration with Deakin University in Melbourne. This review established psychometrically robust and defensible dimensions of board performance, drawing on extensive empirical data and contemporary governance research. The result is a validated, world-class board effectiveness survey grounded in evidence rather than assumption.

Few board frameworks have been subjected to this level of academic scrutiny. Rigorous validation requires substantial data — typically drawn from hundreds of board reviews — which many review providers have not accumulated. The WhatWhoHowDo refinement process was informed by a significant body of board data, ensuring both reliability and relevance.

Through this analysis, 20 distinct factors were identified as the most critical indicators of board effectiveness. These factors form the foundation of our survey, providing boards with structured, credible insight into how effectively they are governing and where improvement will have the greatest impact.

Each board’s effectiveness is first benchmarked against boards of comparable organisations, as shown below.

Each board is also benchmarked in relation to the 20 most important dimensions for a board’s effectiveness, as shown in the example below.

Each survey item comprising each of the 20 dimensions is benchmarked, as shown in our sample report.

Many clients tell us that our benchmarking makes all the difference! They say if our benchmarking colours were removed, interpreting our reports would be much more difficult. Our report design and use of benchmarking make our report intuitive and easy to understand. ‘Hot spots’ are highlighted very quickly and easily.

The 20 most important categories of a board’s effectiveness are explained in detail below.