KUALA LUMPUR (June 10): The Institute of Corporate Directors Malaysia (ICDM) will focus on diversifying the age diversity by bringing more younger directors into boards in a bid to help boards stay attuned to values across all generations and create values, and help companies to stay relevant in the market.
ICDM president and chief executive officer Michele Kythe Lim said the focus now is to bring down the age of board candidates, as the bulk or 71% of a total of 788 board candidates are aged between 51 to 69 years, while 22% of them are below 50 years old.
“We are trying to bring the average [age] down and this is exactly what we are doing. There is a huge focus now on building up candidates at a younger age,” she told the media after ICDM's annual general meeting.
“I am a huge believer in diversity, especially in age because diversity is not just gender, there is age, tenure… but age is a huge focus for us now because with age you find their skill sets. The younger ones are bringing the needed skill sets to boards now, which are innovation, entrepreneurship, different mindsets and approaches.
“If you see our diversity study and index that we launched last year, [companies need] what we call the generational gap on a board. It is not just only the seniors, it's not just only the juniors, you want that [age] gap so that both perspectives are on board and that is very, very important. That is what we are focusing on now, trying to build that up and it's slowly building up,” she elaborated.
To date, ICDM has 788 qualified director candidates in its registry where the bulk are men at 530 individuals, while the remaining 258 are women.