Women on Boards Project

You can hire the right board members and still underuse them into irrelevance. The most common way founders waste a great board is what happens after the hiring process: the meetings run too operationally, the strategic questions never make it into the room, and the board slowly becomes a status meeting instead of the sharpest advisory conversation you have all quarter. Start with the legal basics: board composition documented in your operating or shareholder agreement, signed director agreements, D&O insurance, and a board calendar set for the year. These aren't optional, and serious candidates will ask about them before they agree to serve. Then run meetings like strategic conversations, not status updates. Distribute a pre-read 5 to 7 days ahead so no one is skimming it in the Uber. Open with the highest-stakes, most unresolved question facing the company, not a recap of what happened last quarter. And build in an executive session where board members meet without management. That's where the candid feedback happens on both sides. Define the CEO-board relationship explicitly before there's any conflict, not during one. How will you communicate between meetings? What decisions need board approval versus CEO discretion? The founders who get the most from their boards treat board members like partners: honest about the hard stuff, with space for disagreement, and follow-through on what the board flags. And before we sign off on this one… One thing worth flagging: 11 of our partner companies have been acquired since we started W Project in 2020. All of them were well-boarded and well-governed. Well-run boards make companies more valuable when it counts. That being said, we put together a full guide for founders building their first board, covering the matrix, board structure, governance, comp, and the missteps most people don't see coming. Link below! https://lnkd.in/ghveCrBG

September did NOT come to play!. 🎉 19 women joined company boards this month, across 18 companies.A few of our favorite moments: Three boards didn't wait for a seat to open, they built one. Quanta Services, Inc., Fortive and Albertsons Companies each added a brand new seat to their boards this month, and each of those seats went to a woman. Consumer brands showed up big. Heidi O'Neill officially took the helm at lululemon. Meg Whitman became the first executive chair of Albertsons. Kirsten Green, the investor who backed Warby Parker and Dollar Shave Club early, joined the board at Gap. And the aisles were busy too, with new board members at Lundberg Family Farms, Steven Smith Teamaker and Frontier Co-op (ahem, all W Project placements!). So grab your coffee (or your Smith tea) and join us in congratulating: Beth Springer, Lundberg Family Farms Betsy Frost, Steven Smith Teamaker Monisha Dabek, Frontier Co-op Alessandra Genco, Rolls-Royce Catherine McLeod-Seltzer, IAMGOLD Corporation Heidi O'Neill, lululemon Kirsten Green, Gap Martine Zimmermann, Candel Therapeutics Virginia Gambale, Avalanche Ellen Rubin, Quanta Services, Inc. Susan Main, Fortive Julie Streich, Apogee Enterprises, Inc. Karen Vousden, Faeth Therapeutics Meg Whitman, Albertsons Companies Darlene J. Nicosia, Ball Corporation Sherry L. Buck, Ball Corporation Sabrina Farmer, Flywire @Nancy Freda-Smith, Tempest Therapeutics Amanda Staveley, Ctrl Alt Boards should reflect the people who buy what they make. September proved it's more than possible. Seat openers, October is all yours. 👀 #WomenOnBoards #BoardDiversity #ConsumerBrands #Leadership

We’re so excited to celebrate Beth Springer on her election to the Board of Directors of Lundberg Family Farms - a terrific outcome on a search we were proud to help support! Beth brings decades of experience as both an operator and a board director, with a career rooted in the consumer businesses she knows best: building brands, shaping strategy, driving growth, and helping companies navigate important moments of change. Today, she serves as Lead Independent Director of Central Garden & Pet and as an independent director of AAA Mountain West Group. She has also served on the boards of Nature's Sunshine Products and Amy's Kitchen and brings deep experience across consumer products, governance, and brand-led businesses. Naturally, given her background, Lundberg as a next step just made sense. Beth shared that she was particularly drawn to the company because of its commitment to regenerative organic agriculture and the fact that the company has a woman CEO and Chair of the Board (which, of course, we love, too).  As a family-owned brand with deep roots in organic and regenerative agriculture, Lundberg Family Farms has spent generations building a business that restores the land while bringing high-quality rice products to consumers. It's a place where Beth's experience can have a meaningful impact. Her combination of consumer perspective, operating experience, strategic thinking, and governance expertise makes her a natural addition to the board!  We’re proud to have been part of the conversation that helped bring this match together, and even more excited to see Beth step into this board room. Congratulations, Beth and Lundberg! 🌾 Pictured with Beth are Anders Lundberg, VP of Farming & Grower Partnerships, and Brita Lundberg, Communications Manager, both fourth-generation family members and farmers.

What started as one mom testing baby food recipes in her Berkeley kitchen turned into one of the fastest-growing food brands to hit the public markets this year. Yes, really. Meet Cassandra Curtis, Jennifer Garner (well, you probably already know her), Ari Raz, and John Foraker, the co-founders of Once Upon a Farm. Cassandra couldn’t find a baby food on shelves that met her own standards, so she built one, pioneering the first cold-pressed, organic baby food in the process. Ari was doing the same thing on the East Coast, and the two joined forces early on. We’ll be candid: we’re obsessed. With the founders AND the product (still our go-to for the toddler-approved smoothie pouches, no debate necessary). When the baby food aisle offered nothing but heat-processed jars, they didn’t settle, they innovated. Instead of accepting the industry standard, they brought high-pressure processing to baby food for the first time, locking in nutrients without the heat. John brought decades of CPG leadership from Annie's Inc., and Jennifer brought her own family farm roots in Locust Grove, Oklahoma, straight into the brand’s DNA. In February 2026, Once Upon a Farm went public on the NYSE, raising roughly $198 million and landing a valuation of about $724 million.  The brand is now in more than 22,000 stores nationwide,  proof that a nutritious idea born in one kitchen can become a category leader. (We love a disruptor.) This team is scaling a brand while reshaping what parents expect to find in the baby food aisle, proving a kitchen experiment can go all the way to the trading floor. We’re already restocking the pouches. Running to Whole Foods (or wherever you grab yours), BRB.

We’ve got news (and it’s SPICY! 😉) We’re so excited to celebrate another Women on Boards Project placement: Monisha Dabek has been elected to the Board of Directors of Frontier Co-op. Monisha is a seasoned (we can’t help it) executive with more than 20 years of experience across global public and privately held companies. She brings deep expertise in brand building, innovation, supply chain, R&D, end-to-end P&L management, and talent development. Her career spans some of the most dynamic businesses in food and beverage, including leadership roles at Ocean Spray Cranberries, Danone, and PepsiCo. She has led brands from strategy through execution, built high-performing cross-functional teams, managed complex P&Ls, and driven growth across both entrepreneurial and mature CPG environments. Her work with purpose-driven brands including Silk and So Delicious reflects a passion for connecting business growth with purpose, mission, and values — a perspective that also made her experience a natural fit for Frontier Co-op. Monisha’s most recent role included COO of Ocean Spray Cranberries, a grower-owned cooperative of 700 family farmers, where she oversaw commercial, supply chain, manufacturing, and R&D and sustainability teams. Her experience is particularly well matched to Frontier Co-op, a member-owned cooperative with roots dating back to 1976 and a portfolio that includes Frontier Co-op and Simply Organic. The company is guided by a mission to nourish people and planet and always be fair, with a business model built around responsible sourcing, sustainability, and long-term value for its member-owners. Their CEO, Tony Bedard, said it best: “Women on Boards was a valuable partner in helping us identify outstanding board candidates, and Monisha quickly stood out for her leadership experience, strategic perspective, and alignment with Frontier Co-op's values. We are excited to welcome her to our Board of Directors.” Monisha’s combination of consumer expertise, operational leadership, and experience scaling purpose-driven CPG businesses will bring valuable perspective to Frontier Co-op’s board. Congratulations, Monisha and Frontier! We can’t wait to watch what happens next.

The single most common mistake we see founders make when building their first board is treating the search like a favor exchange instead of a real hiring process. A few DMs to investors, a couple of coffee introductions, a name that keeps coming up, and suddenly you've hired someone who was easy to find rather than someone who fits the gap. A real board search runs on a different set of rules, and knowing them ahead of time saves you from the kind of hire you'll regret for years. Before you talk to a single candidate, write a candidate profile, which is *not* the same thing as a job description. It should call out the functional expertise you need, the specific background that would make someone immediately useful, the networks that add value, and the personal qualities that fit how your board operates. It should be specific enough that two people shown it would generate overlapping lists of names. We use a Director Search Brief when we're gauging interest with candidates, and it's a good starting document for founders running their own search too. Once you have a profile, source broadly. Your investor network, sector-specific organizations, peer founders who've made great board adds, your own ecosystem of former colleagues and collaborators. The best board candidates won't surface if you only work off the names you already know. When it's time to interview, send materials in advance and then focus on how they think, not what they've done. What's their read on your category? What's the biggest mistake they've seen CPG companies make at your stage? Tell me about a time you disagreed with a CEO you were advising, and what you did. Pay close attention to the questions THEY ask you, too. A strong candidate walks in having researched your category, your competitors, and your recent news, and the quality of their questions tells you more than the quality of their answers. You also need to check references, and not just the ones the candidate schedules. Talk to people who've worked with this person directly, and ask about the things that don't show up on a résumé. One thing worth flagging: in the 77 searches we've run since 2020, most take between 4 and 8 months from kickoff to placement. That timeline isn't a bug, it's the whole point. A board member you'll work with for years deserves a search that’s intentional!

One of the things we love most about the Women on Boards Project community is the people we get to meet — and the ideas they’re bringing into the world. We recently had the chance to spend some time with Logan Williams, who has joined our team, and were immediately struck by his curiosity, thoughtfulness, and genuine instinct for connecting people. He’s also helping build something that caught our attention: Sourmilk. Founded by Elan Halpern and Kirsten (Kiki) C., Sourmilk is rethinking Greek yogurt through the lens of gut health, bringing a fresh perspective to a category that has long been a staple of the American food system. We’re particularly excited to see two young women building in dairy—a space where women have historically played an important role as consumers and producers, but where leadership and innovation haven’t always reflected that (and you know what we say… boards should reflect the consumers they serve!). There’s something special about people who see an opportunity to do things differently and then actually build it. Elan and Kiki are doing exactly that with Sourmilk, and Logan is bringing that same curiosity and connective spirit to the W Project community. We’re excited to have all three of them in our orbit — and even more excited to see what they continue to do with Sourmilk!

Most founders start a board search by asking "who do we know?" That's backwards, and it's the single most common mistake we see. This fall, we're breaking down what it actually takes to thoughtfully build your first board, from the matrix to governance to the missteps most founders don't see coming until they're in them. First up: figuring out what seat you actually need. Before a single conversation happens, build a board matrix: a simple grid mapping your current board against the capabilities and networks your business will need over the next 2 to 3 years. Retail strategy. Finance and M&A. Marketing and brand-building. Supply chain. Legal and regulatory. E-commerce. International expansion. Once you map what you have, the white space becomes visible. That white space is the seat. Not a seat that reinforces the perspective already in the room, but one that fills a gap you're about to hit, not one you already solved. Once you know the gap, define what you're actually offering. A voting board director carries formal fiduciary responsibility and attends every meeting. An independent director creates a check on affiliated parties, and if your board is currently just you and your investors, this should almost certainly be your first external add. A board observer can listen but not vote. A board advisor is a flexible, lower-commitment way to bring in expertise before you're ready for a formal seat. One structural note that matters: if you have the choice, create a new independent seat rather than reallocating one currently held by an investor. It keeps the dynamics cleaner and signals you're building a board for the company's benefit. And one more thing before we go… 57% of W Project placements are first-time board members. You read that right – fresh perspective on a real gap beats a recycled name every time. We put together a full guide for founders building their first board, covering the matrix, board structure, governance, comp, and the missteps most people don't see coming. The link is in the comments!

A year of Women on Boards Project on Substack. When we launched our Substack one year ago, the goal was simple: create another place to bring the work of Women on Boards Project to life. Since then, it’s become a space to share the women joining new boardrooms, the conversations shaping our work, the people and organizations we’re learning from, and the ideas we keep coming back to about what it actually takes to create more pathways to the boardroom. We’ve celebrated first-time board members and the women adding second, third, and fourth seats. We’ve shared the numbers behind the work, introduced you to members of our community, highlighted companies doing things differently, and given a little more of a behind-the-scenes look at the people behind W Project. And perhaps most importantly, it’s given us a place to stay connected beyond the moments when we’re in the same room. One year in, we’re reminded that this work has never been about simply getting more women onto boards. It’s about building the relationships, systems, and opportunities that make those seats possible — and creating momentum that continues long after one woman gets her first seat. Thank you to everyone who has read, subscribed, shared, commented, recommended a story, celebrated a placement, or simply followed along. And a very special thank you to our paid subscribers, whose support helps make this work possible and allows us to continue investing in the ideas, conversations, and community that move women forward. Here’s to year two! https://lnkd.in/gBvqZCpM

Steven Smith Teamaker just added a powerhouse CPG operator to its board — in a search led by Women On Boards Project and backed by NextWorld Evergreen. Meet Betsy Frost, the newest board member at Steven Smith Teamaker! Betsy brings a particularly deep understanding of the beverage space. As CEO of Q Mixers, she has scaled the brand and helped build it into a standout in the premium mixer category. She also serves on the board of Hoplark Brews and Teas, giving her experience across both beverage and tea. That’s what makes this placement so compelling. Betsy isn’t simply an experienced CPG operator; she brings specialist expertise that directly aligns with where Steven Smith Teamaker is headed. Founded in 2009 on the legacy of tea visionary Steven Smith, Steven Smith Teamaker has been redefining what American tea can taste like. Betsy’s experience scaling a beverage brand, combined with her perspective across the category, will be a valuable asset as Steven Smith Teamaker enters its next chapter of growth. Congratulations, Betsy and Smith. We’re so excited to see this placement come to life!