STI companies making more of an effort to refresh their boards, but director pool still small: report

BLUE-CHIP counters listed on the Singapore Exchange last year took in the largest cohort of new directors in 5 years, Heidrick and Struggles’ Board Monitor Singapore 2022 report showed.

New director appointments for the 30 Straits Times Index (STI) counters came in at 41, up from 35 in 2020, according to the report released on Wednesday (Sep 21).

Jiat-Hui Wu, partner in charge of Heidrick & Struggles’ Singapore office, said one of the reasons behind the “increased appetite for board refreshment” this year could be the 9-year term limit for independent directors of Singapore-listed companies.