Corporate competitive environment suggests that the size and global complexity of twenty-first-century corporations have out-paced the development of their corporate boards of directors. The current state of boards, however, reflects a stilted state of development in which weak boards often fail to carry out their duties of oversight of corporate leadership and performance. It is instructive to trace evolution of boards with the rise of the corporation and to understand how boards generally work today and how they could be reinvented to become more effective. The Securities and Exchange (SEC) Act and agency were part of newly elected US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal program. Roosevelt selected Joseph Kennedy, a successful and respected businessman, to lead the SEC and serve as its first chairman. Kennedy was instrumental in convincing executives of the need for regulation in order for corporations to have access to the public capital markets that would provide the financial resources required for growth throughout the economy.