Research: Why Your Board Should Include a Long-Tenured Director

Harvard Business Review (Dec 2024) argues that long-tenured independent directors can be an effective governance mechanism, linked in research to greater performance and reduced exposure to outside risks. The piece anchors the case in Silicon Valley Bank's 2023 collapse: at SVB, five directors out of twelve had a tenure of less than three years and three had served less than twelve months at the time of failure. The article also flags a balance constraint — boards should keep one or two long-tenured directors for stability, knowledge and credible oversight, but not so many that entrenchment sets in. Useful for SEA mid-market boards regularly told to rotate aggressively.