Almost nine in 10 C-Suite executives believe their organisations must do more to improve governance if they want to be ready to meet potential risks this year, according to a report from The Corporate Governance Institute (TCGI).
The report – Boardroom Resilience in 2026: Independent Research Into Board Readiness and Risk Strategy – found that 86% of senior executives agreed that their organisations must do more to address potential governance blind spots or deficiencies.
TCGI – a corporate governance training and professional networking organisation – based the report on a survey of 500 board directors and C-Suite leaders at legal, finance, healthcare and education businesses in the UK and Ireland.
While 80% of respondents said they are concentrating on improving regulatory compliance, only 22% identify the complex regulatory environment as a top business risk.
And while 85% of executives feel confident in their board, only 35% say they have high confidence in addressing specific governance and compliance issues.
Ciaran Bollard, CEO of The Corporate Governance Institute, said: “Boards today are facing an agenda that has fundamentally changed. Cybersecurity, AI, ESG and regulatory complexity are, without a doubt, core governance responsibilities. It’s no use treating them like emerging ideas and giving them only a fraction of attention.
“Our research shows that while many directors feel confident in their boards overall, that confidence does not always extend to the specific governance capabilities organisations need to stay resilient in 2026. This paradox is alarming. It ignores the fact that escalating cybersecurity threats, fast-moving AI adoption, rising ESG expectations and increasingly complex regulatory environments are now firmly on the boardroom agenda.”
With regards to ESG, 41% of boards currently lack a formal governance oversight approach, with 15% having no plans to implement one. And while most executives (90%) believe they are addressing diversity, 60% say there is no ethnic diversity within their boards and 53% say there is no gender diversity.
For legal-related businesses, only 29% of respondents said AI implementation was a short-term priority, the lowest out of all sectors. Almost 5% said it was no priority at all, the highest proportion out of all sectors.
Poor governance is not just a regulatory risk. More than three quarters of respondents (76%) agree that governance failures can directly damage employee satisfaction. However, 30% of executives regard cultural resistance to change as an obstacle to implementing effective governance.
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