Suzanne Brown: The NYSE Board Diversity Initiative.
Boardroom Governance with Evan Epstein
Books that Have Influenced Their Lives
The speakers share their thoughts on two books that have had a significant impact on their lives, 'Don Quixote' and 'Start With Why', discussing the historical context and core message of each.
0:00 -- Intro.
1:43 -- Start of interview.
2:11 -- Suzanne's "origin story" "One of my proudest jobs was working with the NJ Pandemic Relief Fund"
14:12 -- Joining the NYSE Board Diversity Initiative. *reference to Chief ("the only private membership network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders")
15:22 -- Three key NYSE ESG Initiatives:
- The NYSE Sustainability Advisory Council (tackling the "E" in ESG)
- The NYSE/Syndio collaboration (tackling the "S" in ESG)
- The NYSE Advisory Board Council (tackling the "G" in ESG). It was created to help identify and place diverse candidates to serve on boards (*it has placed 38 board candidates, as of the date of this recording).
- Council: 25 members ("it launched in 2019 with 16 CEOs of the NYSE")
- Candidates: ~700 CEO vetted candidates.
- Companies: all ~2,400 NYSE listed companies + private PE/VC backed companies.
25:04 -- On placing directors on cross-listed (international) companies. "Over 15% of our candidates are international"
26:39 -- On the impact of SB-826, AB-979 and other board diversity efforts. "Intentionality [on this topic] works"
28:47 -- On the ESG and DEI backlash. "ESG really suffers from a branding problem."
31:46 -- Board dynamics, age and generational shifts in the boardroom. "The avg age of directors has remained at 64 years old."
33:57 -- On the evolution and trends in board diversity. On the "pipeline falacy."
36:33-- Current state of capital markets. History of the NYSE.
40:27 -- Other corporate governance trends: term limits, board evaluations ("it's what you do with it afterwards"), global supply chain, green energy transition and cybersecurity expertise. *reference to E107 with David Larcker and Brian Tayan
46:00 -- Books that have greatly influenced her life:
- Don Quijote by Miguel de Cervantes (1605 and 1615)
- Start with Why by Simon Sinek (2009)
47:54 -- Her mentors, and what she learned from them: "it's more of a collective with other women."
48:41 -- Quotes she thinks of often or lives her life by: "Success is not final, failure is not fatal, it's the courage to carry on that counts." Winston Churchill.
49:18 -- An unusual habit or an absurd thing that he loves: "I love to research obscure dogs."
51:35 -- The living person she most admires: Jimmy Carter.
Suzanne Brown currently leads the NYSE's effort to place more diverse candidates on corporate and private company boards.
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Twitter: @evanepstein
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/epsteinevan/
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Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License
You can follow Evan on social media at:
X: @evanepstein
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/epsteinevan/
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Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License
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