Why Your Board Needs to Evolve as You Scale

When you're building a business, you’re constantly evolving, and your board should be too.

Yet I see too many founders and CEOs clinging to their early-stage board for too long. The truth is, the board that supported you in your early days isn’t always the board that will help you navigate scale, lead through complexity, or reach your next big milestone. And that’s OK.

What matters is recognising when the time has come to make a change, and being prepared to do it with clarity, compassion, and courage.

Why Boards Need to Be Fluid

There are many reasons why the composition of your board might need to change as your business grows:

• Changing circumstances - Maybe you've pivoted the business, or you're facing challenges the current board doesn’t have the experience to help you navigate.

• New phase, new needs - As a female founder scaling your business, you may need new kinds of support - from strategic growth advice and leadership coaching, to experience navigating bias in investment or complex board dynamics. If your board isn’t equipped to champion you through this next phase, it’s time to rethink."

• Dynamics that aren’t serving you - Sometimes it’s about energy. Perhaps there’s a board member who’s checked out, or whose style is increasingly misaligned with your leadership. Tension doesn’t always mean bad people, it just means change is needed.

• Governance evolution - As you grow, you may need to add more independence, greater diversity, or different skill sets to meet investor or regulatory expectations.

Making Change Easier: Set Up the Right Contracts

One of the most important things you can do is build flexibility into your board agreements from the start. That means:

• Clear, time-bound terms (e.g. 12-month rolling contracts or fixed three-year terms).

• Role descriptions that can be revisited annually.

• Clauses that allow either party to step down gracefully if it’s no longer a fit.

• A review process - ideally tied into your broader strategic planning cycle - that creates space for regular reflection on board performance and composition.

If you’re the CEO or Chair, this sets the tone: we’re all here for what the business needs right now, and that might change.

Navigating the Conversation with Emotional Intelligence

This is where leadership really comes in. Letting a board member go - especially someone who’s been with you from the beginning - can feel tough. But it doesn’t have to be brutal.

• Start with honesty and appreciation. Acknowledge what they’ve contributed, and be clear about why change is needed.

• Focus on the needs of the business, not personal shortcomings. It’s about context, not character.

• Offer options - some board members might prefer to step into an advisory role or ambassadorial position instead.

• Keep it human. This is emotional territory - for them, and for you. Holding space for those feelings is part of being a great leader.

What Happens If You Don’t?

If you avoid these conversations or handle them poorly, the consequences can be serious:

• Stagnation: A board that no longer challenges or supports you effectively will slow you down.

• Frustration: Misaligned dynamics erode trust and sap energy - yours, and your team’s.

• Risk: Investors may lose confidence. Future fundraising can get harder. You might even miss key strategic moves.

Worse still, you can damage relationships with people who once championed you simply because the ending wasn’t handled well.

Leading Through Evolution

Your job as CEO or Chair isn’t to keep everyone happy, it’s to keep the business healthy. That means knowing when to make the hard calls, and doing it in a way that honours the people involved.

A board isn’t a fixed structure... it’s a living, evolving group of humans. When you embrace that, and create the systems and culture to support change, your board becomes what it should be: a powerful asset to help you lead through every stage of growth.