Board Succession Planning

Highest Succession Risk Boards

Boards scoring 50+ on the 5-factor succession risk model — chair tenure, board fragility, skills concentration, pipeline readiness, sector supply

Company	Chair	Risk Score	Board Size	Chair Tenure	9+ yr Dirs	Skill Gaps	Successors	Rating
TRA Turners Automotive Group	Grant Baker	76	8	17yr	5	7C / 0S	2	Critical
CMO The Colonial Motor Company Limited	Ashley James Waugh

Tenure Cliff Risk

Boards with 3 or more directors at 9+ years tenure — simultaneous rotation risk may cause institutional knowledge loss

Company	Board Size	9+ yr Directors	% At Risk	Avg Tenure	Ready Successors	Risk
MFT Mainfreight Limited	12	7	58%	19.1yr	5	High
FRW Freightways Group Limited	12	6	50%	10.4yr	7	High
FSF Fonterra Shareholders' Fund	20

Skills Concentration Risk (Market-wide)

Skill categories with the most single-point-of-failure or critical gap boards across NZX

Skill Category	Critical (No Expert)	Total At Risk
Legal & Compliance	128	128
Industry Experience	128	128
Risk Management	128	128

NZX Director Tenure Distribution

Director cohorts by appointment era — identifies pipeline health and rotation needs

Early Rotation

10+ years

153

14% of all directors

Mid-Tenure

7-9 years

193

17% of all directors

Established

4-6 years

240

21% of all directors

New Cohort

0-3 years

532

48% of all directors

Sector Succession Risk

Average succession risk and critical board count by sector

Sector	Companies	Avg Risk	Critical	Avg Tenure
Consumer Discretionary	14	58	1	7.1yr
Healthcare	12	53	0	6yr
Materials	9	52	0	3.2yr

Full Succession Risk Register

All 128 NZX boards ranked by succession risk score (0-100)

Company	Risk	Board	Avg Tenure	9+ yr	Cliff	Rating
TRAConsumer Discretionary	76	8	10.2yr	5	Yes	Critical
CMOConsumer Discretionary	74	7	10.4yr	3	Yes

Methodology

The succession risk score is a 5-factor weighted model (each 20%):

Chair Tenure Risk: Scores 0 for chairs under 7 years, 40 at 7-8 years, 70 at 9-11 years, and 100 at 12+ years.
Board Fragility: Percentage of board members with 9+ years tenure. 40%+ of the board at rotation age scores 100.
Skills Concentration: Counts critical gaps (no experienced/expert director in a skill) and single-point-of-failure risks (only one). Each critical gap adds 20 points, each single-point adds 10.
Pipeline Readiness: Counts independent directors with 5+ years tenure as ready successors. 3+ ready successors scores 10 (low risk), 0 scores 100 (high risk).
Sector Supply: Board changes across sector peers in the past 12 months — higher churn indicates greater competition for replacement candidates.

Cliff risk is flagged when 3 or more directors on the same board have 9+ years tenure, indicating potential simultaneous rotation. Skills data comes from the IoD-aligned 12-category skills matrix extracted from director biographies.