Look For Board Members Who Love Your Mission

Building Your Board of Directors with Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman

The relationship between a CEO and the board of directors is a long-term partnership that can span for more than a decade. As a company scales, it’s important for leaders to have strong relationships with their board members, built on a foundation of trust and transparency. Each board seat is important, and every new board member should add a new set of skills, experiences, and perspectives to the group.

Redfin’s CEO Glenn Kelman joined us at The Scaleup Offsite to share how his relationship with the board of directors has evolved over the year. He speaks from the heart about how to think about building a pipeline for your board, how to interview potential candidates, and how to leverage their skills and knowledge for the success of the company.

• Finding Mission Driven Board Members: Good board members love your mission, listen more than they talk, and attend every meeting in-person.
• Building Pipeline: Draft a job description that articulates the background and skills needed in your next board member. Use it to guide your recruiting process. Consider asking founders at similar companies for advice, and use executives and board members from your company to source candidates.
• Diversity: Incorporate diversity in the board early on. Your employees will recognize and appreciate it. (Glenn dives deeper into how his own thinking needed to change on diversity in a blog post shared through Redfin.)
• Interviewing: When interviewing potential board members, don’t focus on being impressive or being impressed. You cannot truly listen in either mode.
• Your Board Isn’t The Problem: At the end of the day, the CEO is the one in charge of operating the company. If the product is not selling or working, that is the CEO’s problem — not a board problem.
• Board Meeting: Board meetings should always be held in-person and include printed documents. A lot will be lost in simply projecting a powerpoint. Glenn also recommends that companies share most board meeting documents internally with the whole company to maintain a high level of transparency.

This presentation was recorded at The Scaleup Offsite, an event focused on scaling companies co-hosted by Greylock Partners and YC Continuity. Talks will be available on video on Greylock’s YouTube channel and on our podcast channels.

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