This post addresses remarks by Admiral Jim Stravidis to the New England Chapter of National Association of Corporate Directors. My prior post outlined the Admiral’s understanding of the world order today and its immediate geopolitical prospects. He emphasized that directors must have a deep understanding of the world order in setting policy for American companies. It is up to the board to deep dive into strategic planning; management is so busy with the day-to-day running of an enterprise that it is the board that should undertake the background thinking, bringing that to board meetings where it can be evaluated by management.
Hand in hand with the board’s need to have deep understanding of the world order is the necessity for the Board to maintain high levels of personal information about world business markets. In this regard he offered a reading list of two books and two publications: The Thinking Machine by Jensen Huang (CEO of Invidia); 1929 by Andrew Ross Sorkin (a sobering read); weekly read of the magazine The Economist; current business news through the Financial Times.
Doubling down on the emphasis on having robust current information to set policy, he suggested consideration of retaining a consulting firm for further support.
Board thinking should include a “Plan B” if the primary plan does not work as anticipated. Look to history for guidance.
What are the major business areas of opportunities today? Here his advice centered on major enterprises. But if you are not a director of an enterprise of such substance as to be in the market directly to participate, what if any is your strategic opportunity to support these opportunities?
The nine areas of major opportunity today:
- Engage with China. Fight the reticence.
- Work to “rewire” business with the oil powers: Iran, Venezuela, Russia. (I note his supposition that oil will remain a very major commodity; never in an hour and half did he mention/tout renewables/global warming factors.)
- Rebuilding Ukraine (major business opportunity; historical analogy was rebuild of South Korea; no mention of Gaza btw).
- India–crucial.
- Brazil: not as big as India, but big.
- AI (no surprise here).
- Defense spending. Trump in the US, NATO countries in Europe, Japan doubling military budget, India.
- Quantum Computing (details unclear but in five years will be “huge”)
- Cyber Security (this is a policy matter for board, not to be left to the techies)
Of these, the one most surprising to me was reference to quantum computing and I am intending to attend the March 3 upcoming online program put on by NACD-New England (which sponsored the Stavridis program herein discussed), entitled “Quantum Computing: Staying Ahead of the Technology Curve.” Search for NACD-New England on line to sign up. (Note: I am former board member and current advisory board member of this NACD chapter.)