“Why don’t we have AI make us a backup?”
It was a simple question, asked by an independent director, in the middle of an ERP project update at our May 2026 board meeting. It could have been a throwaway line, overlooked by the group.
Instead, it led to the most consequential decision our organization has made in at least a decade and a powerful lesson on the impact that directors can have, if management truly listens to their feedback.
A little background: I’m blessed to lead Benco Dental, a third-generation family enterprise with 1,700 associates that has been serving dentists and dental laboratories in the United States for nearly 100 years. Last year, our sales were just shy of $1 billion, and we’ve had a fiduciary board with at least four independent members for over a decade.
At the time of this board meeting, we were only a few months away from go-live, with an enterprise resource planning (ERP) scoreboard that read eight years and $38 million invested, far longer and more expensive than planned. Our best people, who were doing excellent work on a complex project, were exhausted. We were on our third IT leader since the project launched. Most importantly, our total focus on ERP meant delaying transformative projects that might move the business forward (think cool sales tools, exciting acquisitions and big initiatives).
Our internal project name was “Onward,” a brand that became more ironic as the years dragged on, as in “We can’t wait to move onward from this project.”
The tension during this board meeting’s project update was at “sh*t’s getting real” level. Everyone in the room knew that we had little room for error when we threw the switch on the new system. So, the suggestion that we leverage AI programming tools like Claude and Codex to create a backup version for use in a break-glass emergency made sense.
It prompted an exchange about the power of AI. Then someone asked, if we can create a backup version, can we use AI to overhaul the current ERP piece by piece, line by line? If so, we’d have a cheaper, on-premise system that will run the business, without the expense or stress of cutting over to a new SaaS system.
Six weeks later, after an in-depth analysis, our IT team determined that we could keep our existing ERP. So, our management team pivoted, abandoning our ERP odyssey in favor of using AI coding tools to incrementally upgrade our current system. The decision saved $6 million in budgeted expenses this year alone, removed the enterprise-level risk of a system go-live and allowed us to focus on projects that can quickly move the organization forward.
A single, well-timed question from an independent director took us down a path that none of us could have foreseen just a few months earlier, one that wouldn’t have been possible if we had thrown the switch on the new system as planned.
Looking back, we learned five lessons from that experience:
Trust is a basic requirement. Without trust, neither management nor directors can hear tough feedback, even when the feedback is needed and correct. For us, trust started a few years before, when our board helped the family work through a thorny leadership and ownership challenge. By leaning in for the tough conversations, the independent directors earned the trust of the family and management.
Management must trust directors and directors must trust management. What doesn’t build trust? Independent directors who show up and throw up on management.
Listen until it hurts. Directors and management need to proactively listen to each other. When our director asked that question, it would have been easy to dismiss it. But sometimes the best feedback and ideas come when we’re least expecting it, and only if we’re willing and able to hear it.(A corollary: Build a culture in which directors disagree agreeably.)
Cover the important topics. Sometimes management doesn’t want to shine a spotlight on the ugly topics, and many families make avoidance an Olympic sport.
In our situation, the independent directors stated firmly that they wanted an update on the ERP project at every board meeting, even when the report wasn’t positive. They were right.
Be proactive about succession planning. We all know the reasons not to cycle out independent directors: they know the business, all the shareholder groups are comfortable, we don’t want to insult anyone, finding and agreeing on a new director will be too hard and take too long.
Bunk! Term limits and a robust selection process are key to a well-functioning board. One of the biggest disagreements our family had was over our succession plan for independent directors. Thankfully, we resolved the issue in favor of regular director turnover. The director who asked the question that prompted our pivot was a “fresh” director who had only joined our board a few years before.(A corollary: On-board and empower new directors so they feel comfortable contributing immediately. If they don’t feel comfortable speaking up, what’s the point of adding them?)
Find a tech-experienced director. Tech is changing quickly, and tech-savvy leaders willing to serve as independent directors are in-demand and hard to find. Yep … but keep looking anyway, and don’t give up. It’s no coincidence that the director who asked the AI ERP question was our “tech member,” someone who lives, eats, and breathes tech and AI every day.
One director asked a question and management listened and determined whether the idea could work. That’s effective governance: directors secure enough to challenge management and management secure enough to listen and pivot appropriately.
Business guru Marshall Goldsmith famously said, “Feedback is a gift.” But not all feedback is created equal. Robust feedback from independent directors who are encouraged to ask tough questions isn’t like the $25 birthday check that arrived in an envelope every year from your Aunt Jennie. It’s like a winning, life-changing lottery ticket.