Image of Andrew Escobar
TRANSCRIPT
Matt
Welcome back to Sound-Up Governance. This is Matt Fullbrook. In this episode, I talked to a real life unicorn with a horn and wings and everything. Okay...no, my conversation this time is with Andrew Escobar. What makes him so special? Andrew is in his mid 30s, and has more than a decade of board experience in a complex organization. He's also an expert at the intersection between emerging technologies and strategy, currently specializing in open banking. He's been in the governance space long enough to go from zero to embracing the status quo to evolving beyond the status quo, and he's still got like 40 years of runway left if he wants it. In other words, he's what everyone's looking for. If I were to ask 20 boards to tell me what they'd want in a director if they could wave a magic wand and get literally anything, 19 of them would describe Andrew almost to a T. So obviously, Andrew can basically write his own ticket, right? Turns out the answer is an unequivocal "no". But before we get to that, how exactly did Andrew's remarkable journey get started?
Andrew Escobar
My mother was a social worker for many, many years. And the agency she worked at, North York Community House here in Toronto - they're a settlement services agency - and my mom would bring me to the annual general meeting every single year. Right? It was, because it was, it was something special, right? It wasn't just the the boring parts of an AGM, right, appointing your auditors, you know, the reports from the President and the chair. It was like a community affair. Everyone was in attendance, kids were welcome. There was really great food, there was music at times. And so I remember at a really young age, the age of seven or eight when my mom started working as a social worker, going to those AGMs every year, and that really interesting piece of that AGM where they elect or appoint board members. And that to me was like, like my first introduction to what a board was, and that you appoint them or that you vote for them and questions around what did they do and why and why did we vote for them? Like is this necessary? That was my first time understanding what a board was. So a number of years later when I'm you know, 24, sort of still in school, sort of getting my career started, I get the first invite to join a board. I was working in politics at the time. And I was registering these .ca domain names, right? I forget what for but whether it was a local campaign or some other cause or issue that we were working on. And then registering those .ca domain names, I got an invite from the organization that runs the .ca domain name space. We call them I call them CIRA. But they're the Canadian Internet Registration Authority. It's a not for profit organization in Ottawa. But a really sophisticated not for profit in a very technical sense, and that they run critical internet infrastructure. And the .ca domain name was part of that. So all of a sudden, I'm getting invited to join as a member, join this organization as a member. But as a part of that, invited to be a part of their governance process, right? It was an invitation to not only vote for their board, participate in their governance, but to potentially run for their board as well. And that was, I think, when the idea got planted me at the age of 24, that this was something that I could do. That this is something that I could pursue.
Matt
So if you're imagining just some precocious and ambitious, 20-something throwing his hat into the ring and getting lucky, you couldn't be more wrong. Andrew had to work for his first board seat... like, hard.
Andrew Escobar
There are called members on the board, four get reelected every year. Three of those members every year are elected through the traditional nominations process, the one that you're probably familiar with where there's the nominating committee. You can apply, they pick five or six candidates, and there's an election process. But it's built on one sort of deciding that you're qualified, that you're have the experience, that you're good enough. That's the process that I sort of thought of board was. But CIRA had this other component where of those 12 board members, there's three that come directly from the members. Where as a member of the organization, you can apply directly, and if you have enough support from fellow members, you get on that final ballot. You can run and you can win. And there's no one who can tell you "no," there's no one who can tell you're not good enough, you're not ready, you need to wait. At the age of 24, when I finally ran at the age of 25, that was incredibly exciting to me, right? Being able to do it because I wanted to, and I thought I could do it. Even though I didn't think I was fully ready for it yet, that I could jump in headfirst. And if I put the work in, I would win. And I think because I worked in the political process at the time, like I was, I was working for a political party, I understood what nomination races were, what leadership campaigns looked like. And it was very much about attracting new members. Not always convincing existing members. And so I thought about it and I thought, "look, if I approach this in theame way, if I bring new members into CIRA, who already own a .ca domain name, or who can purchase one and use one, that's my way onto this board." So that's what I did! I really worked hard for over a year, because I remember I applied, went through the process and lost the first time I ran only by a few votes, but I lost. So this, you know, two month process turned into a 14 month process to get on the board. And it was very much through a lot of hard work: a lot of campaigning, a lot of calls, a lot of emails, a lot of texts. But that outreach that I learned to do within the political process, I applied it to governance and getting on a board. It's certainly not a traditional way of getting onto a board, but it was my way of of starting.
Matt
I know it's not fair to generalize, but I'm going to anyway: most corporate directors get their first board seat in their 50s or 60s, and then learn what it is to be an effective board member, then only have a decade or two, if they're lucky to evolve before their board journey is over. Andrew is obviously a completely different example. He's already 12 years into his life as a director and has way more than that left if he wants, I asked him how his thinking as a director has evolved so far.
Andrew Escobar
I've been on this board for 11 years, I'm entering my 12 and final year on this board. And it's actually quite easy to think of it in, in three year terms, right? I was elected to a three year term, and then another three three-year terms after that. So, I very much think about my time on this board in three year increments. And if I look back to those first three years, it was very much learning how to be a director and learning how to be a part of a board. Right? What does that mean? How do you do it? And at the time thinking that I was a member of a team, and if I'm going to affect change, I need to do it as part of this team. But it was very much learning to be a board member in the in the traditional way: going out taking education, learning from other directors who had had, in some cases, a lifetime of experience in governance or just being corporate Canada, and seeing how governance works either reporting to a board or serving on a board. It was very much learning from others, learning from those who had who had experienced governance before but in what I would call the traditional sense. I think at some point I became a bit disillusioned with board work or governance work. And I didn't feel like it mattered. And I felt like I wasn't affecting the change that I wanted to. And that might have just been I didn't feel like I was a valued member of that board or included on that board. And I don't mean to put that on any of my fellow directors or the board itself. It's just, I hadn't figured out yet how to contribute. And I don't think that the board knew how I could contribute either. And I think you need you need both of those sides to figure it out. You need to understand what you want to give, and a board needs to understand what they get from you and how they can push you as well. And I hadn't figured it out. My board hadn't figured it out. And so I spent three other years, three additional years - yyear four, five and six - sort of struggling. Struggling to affect change, struggling to figure out how I could contribute, a bit of rebellion, I would say as well, in terms of I was no longer going along to get along. Right? I was more willing to sort of put stuff out there and push ideas and push strategies and push our thinking on certain things that we were doing at CIRA. And I think that that was important to me, right? It wasn't my most productive years on the board. But it was I think the three years were that I took to really explore what it meant to be a board member and how to contribute.
Matt
At first Andrew was going to stop there right where the story was getting good. I mean, a rebellious corporate director? He's obviously speaking my language. So I asked him to tell me the rest of the story
Andrew Escobar
That was followed by three years I think, of amazing work on the board. And I think to sort of just came with change. One of the most difficult things about joining a board at the age of 25 is I think you are forever in the minds of your colleagues that 25 year old, right? Who joins the board, not sure of themselves, not sure of what to do, who spent their first year quite frankly, very quiet, only chiming in when I knew that I could add value, when I knew I had something to say, and I guess maybe usually questioning what I what I had to add. And so I think you tend to be viewed in that light. Over the years, though, the most constant thing on that board, I think, has been my presence. I've been reelected now three times. I'm in my fourth term. And so I think board turnover in many ways, while it wasn't... board turnover, can be healthy for a board. Too much turnover can be unhealthy. But it was really good for me because it meant that I had a constant flow of new board members to not only learn from, but also to influence and to reset expectations, right? Reset expectations of me as a board member, but also reset expectations of what we as the board were here to do. What we *could* do. The art of the possible, right? That to me was exciting. And so that's what what's kept me engaged in these last, you know, that later half been my board time, is that new inflow people have reenergized me. And that also helped me sort of figure out how I can contribute to board work to decision making, to strategy. And so I had the opportunity with a newer board not fully new but generally newer board after six years, a new chair, new members to step into a new role. And I was very lucky to have been appointed the chair of our finance, audit, investment and risk committee. It's a mouthful, but at the time, it made sense to sort of have those four together. And that was, I think, a leap of faith from our chair to appoint me to that kind of position. But it made sense at the time. And and I think I approached it with new eyes like I am not a CPA, I you know, I don't come to it with the experience of having worked with auditors for lifetime. But I did come to it with a lot of experience in finance and investing. And I had, I had a different perspective. And I think those are some really productive years that I had. And I was really lucky to have them at a rather young age. But with it came new challenges, right? Like when when you're suddenly in this role of the committee chair in particularly the audit chair, you're expected to approach it in a very traditional way. And I'm not good at that. Right? That's the one thing that I learned that I'm not, I'm not great at that. I don't like approaching it in traditional ways. Because just because it's the way it's always been done doesn't mean it should be the way it's done now, or even at this organization or with this business. Like at every point in time you need to be reevaluating how you're doing something and why you're doing something the way you're doing it. Some pieces or aspects of government, though, that can't be your approach, right?
Matt
So in short, Andrew went from the quiet new guy to the impatient disrupter to one of the senior voices in the room taking on an important leadership position with the confidence that he could steer it in better ways than what had been done in the past. Let me repeat, he is now in his mid-30s and able to embody the wisdom and gravitas that comes with a dozen years of board experience. This is not normal, but it is super cool. Okay, earlier I really briefly described Andrew's non-board career which is an important element of his value-add in governance. So what is his profession, exactly?
Andrew Escobar
That increasingly feels to me like a ridiculous question to ask people. What's my profession? I had no clue, Matt. Iwouldn't even know where to begin with that. I think that there's I would have great comfort being able to say, well, you know, I'm a CFA, I'm a lawyer. I'm an accountant, I'm an engineer. I'm none of those things. I I always thought that I would pursue one of those things. I think we're where I work is trying to work at the intersect of strategy and technology. Understanding where technology is today, where it's heading a decade from now, and from a strategic perspective understanding how to ride that wave and ride it at the right time. Like when you go out to catch that wave, you don't want to be too early, you don't want to be too late. Timing is everything. Timing is strategy. That's the way I think of what I do.
Matt
And Andrew's current position is in open banking. Right now, all of your banking info just lives with your bank. And if you work with multiple financial institutions, each of them gets to see only a slice of your total banking reality. Open banking is a growing technology movement that makes customers' banking and transaction information openly available to be used by multiple financial technology platforms. Think of it as the banking equivalent of digital medical records that can be shared among multiple physicians and health providers. Open banking will reduce the pain of mundane things like switching banks, but also enable platforms to make recommendations to customers that are based on their actual real life financial circumstances. Anyway, open banking is both emerging and transformational and Andrew's right there. So I hope I've convinced you that he's a unicorn in multiple and intersecting ways, an experienced corporate director with governance training and financial chops whose expertise is at the intersection of emerging technology and strategy. And in his 30s. Obviously, he must be feeling super excited to continue to be involved in corporate governance. And just as obviously, organizations must be tripping over themselves to recruit him to their boards, or at least to make him part of their governance plan. So how's all that going?
Andrew Escobar
Fundamentally, the question comes down to whether governance should be something that's part of my life or not, at this stage in my life, right? I am in my 30s, I have two young kids, and I'm still rather early in my career, and my career is at this stage really, really important to me. I love the work that I'm doing today. But it's... I also love that I've been engaged in governance for over a decade. And it feels like something that I should hold on to, that I could should continue devoting my time to. But you only have so much time in a day, so much time in a week,so much time in a year. And you really start to question if this is the right time for me, or do my kids deserve more of that time? Does my career deserve more of that time? That's, that's a big question to be asking in your 30s. But it's an absolutely valid one. And I think the reason I even have to ask this is that it is still a struggle to stay engaged in governance for me, right? Just because I've served on a board for 11 years, I'm vice chair now, I've served as an audit chair in the past, I have this personal professional designation within governance. That doesn't necessarily mean I am a valued or sought after corporate director. Right? That is almost irrelevant because of my age. Because of my perceived inexperience, my relatively short career, like, those are all strikes against me. And so they sort of discount all the experience I have within governance. And that's sort of hard to navigate. Right? And so it does make you question, "is this something I should continue pursuing? How much work do I really want to put into this?" Almost like, feels like a project of not only continuing in governance, but pushing the envelope forward, within governance. Like pushing on these issues that I care about, within governance broadly, right? Chief among them is diversity of age on our boards. That is an issue that's obviously to me as someone who joined the board at a rather young age something that's really important. And so am I trying to push this notion that you can be a great board member at any age? Or am I trying to find a board that values me and my contributions? Can I solve for both? Do I have time to solve for both? The answer increasingly feels like it's "no." And that's sort of the answer that I'm hearing when I ask others. So I've had this conversation now with a number of people some having even been like senior leaders or chief executives of some of Canada's largest corporations. And I've had this conversation about you know, whether I should still dedicate a lot of my time to governance? And the answer is almost always, surprisingly, "no!, you shouldn't, at this age, it's probably not right. At this point in your career, it's probably not the right time. Focus on your career, develop that, the governance stuff will come later." And even though I've heard it time and time again, from at least four people who I think I respect, given their experience in corporate Canada, it's still something that I haven't let go of. And yet, those words, you know, "don't pursue governance, focus on your career," that looms large in my head, all the time. So it's tough to square what I'm hearing from others who are respected in terms of their thoughts on on governance or leadership, but also my own desire to want to continue serving in governance, but also push the art of the possible forward in governance. I have things that I want to accomplish not on on any specific board, but within governance generally. And like, is it my battle to fight? Do I have time to fight that battle? Am I alone in that battle? It often feels like I am, right? You find people who want to fight alongside you, who understand where you're coming from, but you kind of feel alone in it.
Matt
Uggghhh. Honestly, this is all as depressing, as it is unsurprising. You remember those 19 out of 20 boards, where if they could magically create a perfect board member they would conjure Andrew exactly? Well, not only are they not making it easy for Andrew to see a fruitful path to continue his board journey. But senior corporate leaders are basically telling him to take a break and come back when he's older. It's infuriating, frankly. It's not my style to end things on a dark note, though. So let's let Andrew give us some advice about how to nudge more high potential young people toward board service.
Andrew Escobar
One of the things that I very much appreciated having done my MBA at Robin, is that there was a specific course on governance. And I thought that was great, because I didn't think I would get anything out of it. I had experienced that instructor a number of times before having taken other governance courses at Rotman through the Institute of Corporate Directors. So I sort of sat sat back and observed that class remotely because it was during the pandemic, but it was great to sort of experience it and see my MBA colleagues go through it, and sort of what they took away from it. And then in the bathroom, try to shape their thinking around it. Because I think it was very much taught in a way that, you know, "this is the thing that you will do, you are the leaders of tomorrow, and that tomorrow is 20 or 30 years from now." Right? Not, "this is something that you should engage in today!" Right? Either either you're reporting to your board, or your boss's boss's boss is important to boards. And so this is how it affects your work day to day. This is how this is how you should be framing your thinking around how decisions work their way up an org, or this is how you should be approaching governance today, serving your communities on that hospital board, at that local theatre, at that agency or not for profit, okay? It wasn't framed like that. It was very much framed as something that is happening in corporate Canada today, and that it might be you in the future. But it was not grounded in in I think the reality of of governance in your career today. Right? Because governance is something that happens now! You're you're engaged in it, whether you know it or not. And that was the missing piece for me: that disconnect that you're actually a part of governance today, you're not on that board, you're not serving on that board, but you are very much a part of the governance of your organization. And that that was the missing piece for me.
Matt
I'm sure you can all see why like Andrew so much. Not just for all the incredible hard work he's done in the governance world already, or for the fact that he's positioning himself to be influential around some of the most important emerging technologies in the world, but because he and I speak the same governance language. For all of you listening, no matter your position in your organization's hierarchy, or your expertise or your ambitions, you *are* engaged in corporate governance. Not in the future, not potentially, but actually and right now. For those of you who are educators or leaders, you have an opportunity to embrace and engage your best people so that they can thrive not just where they are right now, but maybe even in your boardroom, too. Thanks for listening to Sound-Up Governance. As always, if you like what you heard, or you want to share any insights or ideas for future guests, send us an email or voice memo to soundup@groundupgovernance.com. Until next time...
Sound-Up Governance (ep5) - The journey of a young corporate director, featuring Andrew Escobar