When people think about scaling a company, they tend to focus on funding rounds, product-market fit, and hiring the right exec team. All critical, of course. But one of the most underutilised and underestimated levers for growth and resilience is this:
A great non-executive board.
The right non-executive directors (NEDs)—and especially a strong chair—can be truly transformative. They’re not in the weeds day-to-day, and that’s precisely the point. Their job is to step back, challenge, provoke, guide, and support. When done well, this creates real value: in strategic clarity, in investor confidence, and in leadership culture.
“A great board doesn’t run your company — it helps you run it better.” — Startup Boards by Brad Feld
More Than a Governance Checkbox
If your board meetings feel like a quarterly box-ticking exercise, you're missing one of your company's greatest strategic levers.
Too often, the board is seen as a necessary formality. A quarterly meeting. A slide deck review. A nod to corporate governance or investor oversight. Or it’s seen as only for bigger companies, or companies post investment.
But that’s a missed opportunity.
The most effective non-exec boards serve as strategic partners to the CEO and executive team. They ask the hard questions. They help the business zoom out when it's deep in operational chaos. They bring pattern recognition from decades of experience—what’s worked, what hasn’t, and what might come next.
And crucially, they aren’t just passive observers. The best ones are deeply engaged, but not interfering. They’re enablers, not obstacles.
When it comes to the chair role, that’s where the real magic can happen. A great chair can be a steady hand, a sounding board, a challenger, and a mentor—all in one. They provide structure to the board, ensure a healthy balance of challenge and support for the CEO, and create the conditions for effective decision-making. An independent chair can be a genuine game changer.
Different Stages, Different Boards
The board you have today won’t be the board you need tomorrow.
Just as your team must evolve to meet new challenges, so must your board.
One of the biggest misconceptions I see, especially in founder-led businesses, is the belief that once you’ve got a board in place, you’re sorted.
But like every other part of your organisation, your board should evolve with the business.
In the early days, it’s typically made up of founders, contacts, and a couple of investor reps. That makes sense when the business is small, and the strategic questions are more about product and survival than scale and structure.
But as you move into growth stages—whether that’s Series B, international expansion, or preparing for exit—the needs shift. Suddenly, you’re facing operational complexity, regulatory hurdles, governance requirements, and much higher stakes. The make-up of your board needs to shift too.
This is where independent NEDs come into their own. You might bring in someone with deep sector knowledge, international scaling experience, or a background in finance or governance. Someone who complements your team and fills the gaps you didn’t even know you had.
And if you’re private equity-backed? The game changes again. You need people who understand exits, restructuring, M&A. People who know how to manage the balance between operational efficiency and long-term value creation.
Getting It Right
At Hyperion, we partner with cleantech companies across all stages—from early VC-backed scale-ups to mature businesses preparing for IPO or strategic sale.
We don’t just find outstanding people. We help companies build the board their future demands—creating leadership cultures that attract capital, unlock growth, and stand the test of scale. I've had the pleasure to host workshops with Techstars around the topic of building your board, and happy to to spend some time with any founders or leadership teams that want to do something similar, a workshop or just some time to discuss.
The make-up of your cap table and non-executive board can make life and success so much more likely—or, if you get it wrong, so much of a headache and hindrance that you’ll cry yourself to sleep.
With over 30 years of search and business experience, I lead most of our board-level searches personally. It’s a part of the work I genuinely love—because when you get it right, the impact is immense.
Final Thoughts
If you’re building something that matters—and I know many of you are—take a moment to ask yourself:
Does my board reflect the next stage of this business?
Do we have the right voices in the room to challenge, support, and guide us forward?
Is our board an asset, an obligation, or a nightmare?
Because when you treat your board like a strategic weapon, you give your company an unfair advantage.
