PRISM 2026 Keynotes Examine What Effective Board Leadership Requires Now
Private company directors are navigating more complex expectations, greater uncertainty and a wider range of board opportunities than ever before. The decisions they make about how they lead, how they work with management and where they choose to serve can have lasting consequences for both the companies they govern and their own board careers.
At PRISM 2026, Suzanne Burns, Herman Bulls and Dr. Denis Mowbray will address these questions from three distinct but connected perspectives. Their keynotes will examine how directors can evaluate board opportunities more carefully, lead more effectively through change and strengthen the human dynamics that shape board performance.
Choosing the right board
Suzanne Burns will open the October 7 program with Not All Private Boards Are Created Equal: Are You Choosing the Right One?, sponsored by PwC.
Private company boards can differ significantly depending on ownership structure. A family-owned business may ask different things of its directors than a private equity portfolio company, ESOP, venture-backed business or early-stage startup. Burns will offer a framework for understanding those differences and evaluating whether an opportunity aligns with a director’s experience, risk tolerance and long-term goals.
As a Senior Partner in Spencer Stuart’s Board, CEO and Private Company Practices, Burns advises boards and senior leaders on director selection, CEO succession, cultural transformation and board effectiveness. Her perspective is also informed by more than 25 years of corporate leadership experience and her current service on several private and nonprofit boards. She serves as President of PDA’s Chicago Chapter and recently completed her term as Chair of the Women Corporate Directors Chicago Chapter.
Her keynote will help directors approach board service with greater discipline, including how to conduct due diligence, recognize potential warning signs and assess whether a board’s governance model and culture are the right fit.
Leading when the playbook no longer applies
Herman Bulls will open the October 6 program with The Adaptive Board Begins With Adaptive Leadership, sponsored by BMO.
Drawing on a career that spans military service, corporate leadership, entrepreneurship and board service, Bulls will examine how directors can build trust, ask better questions and create long-term value when established approaches no longer provide sufficient direction.
Bulls is Vice Chairman, Americas at JLL, where he has spent more than 35 years advising major public and corporate clients. Before joining JLL, he served nearly 12 years on active duty in the U.S. Army, including assignments at the Pentagon and as an assistant professor at West Point. He currently chairs the board of Fluence Energy and serves on the boards of Host Hotels & Resorts and Comfort Systems USA. In 2024, the National Association of Corporate Directors named him Public Company Director of the Year.
His keynote will translate that varied leadership experience into a practical framework directors can use to assess how they respond and contribute when conditions are changing.
Looking beyond board structure
Dr. Denis Mowbray will close the conference on October 7 with Behavioral Governance and the Third Team: Why Boards Still Fail and What Actually Works, sponsored by Pearl Meyer.
For more than three decades, Dr. Mowbray has advised boards and executives across five continents. His doctoral rese
arch introduced the “Third Team,” a framework that views the board and executive leadership not only as separate groups, but also as a combined team whose interactions can shape organizational performance.
A Fellow and Vice President of the Chartered Governance Institute, Dr. Mowbray is a Governance, Strategy, Risk and Compliance Advisor at Gryphon Management. His work examines why boards with appropriate structures, qualified directors and established compliance practices can still underperform or fail.
His keynote will focus on how trust, confidence and the use of collective expertise affect decision-making, recruitment and long-term performance. He will also introduce a diagnostic framework directors can use to evaluate the relationship between their own boards and executive teams.
Together, the three keynotes will address decisions directors can influence directly: which boards they join, how they lead once they are there and how effectively the board works with management.
PRISM 2026 takes place October 5–7 at the Grand Hyatt Atlanta in Buckhead. Register by July 31 to take advantage of early-bird registration rates.