ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the nature of boards, and then move to some of the more interesting psychodynamic aspects of the way they work. Ansett suffered from the effects of corporate neglect, gross mismanagement and interfering governments on both sides of the Tasman. Neglect may be due to laziness but at times neglect can be more wilful, a result of deliberate abandonment. Heath International Holdings (HIH) was established in 1968 as a private company by Raymond Williams and Michael Payne. At a business level, the problem with HIH was that they were underreserving. Their estimate of claims on past policies were underpriced and could not be met. HIH board members, it seems, were selectively lazy, choosing not to attend to the risks that they should have been bound to attend to. Sloth can be popularly defined as: laziness; idleness and wastefulness of time allotted.
