BOARDROOM ELITE

Steering Sri Lanka’s corporate juggernaut

An organisation’s leader plays a crucial role in its success and governance, serving as the bridge between shareholders and management. This role involves providing strategic guidance, setting long-term goals, and ensuring that the company operates in line with ethical and legal standards.

Such leadership drives organisations towards sustained growth and stability.

Leading the elite list for financial year 2023/24 are three prominent figures: Chairman of Hayleys Mohan Pan­dithage, Chairman of Management Systems (MSL) Asite Talwatte and businesswoman Brindhiini Perera, each holding eight board seats among Sri Lanka’s top listed companies.

A pivotal force at Hayleys over the years, Pandithage has served as a director since 1988 and assumed the role of chairman in 2009.

In 2022, Perera made history as the youngest individual to serve on the boards of Sri Lanka’s listed companies as a non-executive director.

This duo helmed the directorates rankings in financial year 2022/23 and continue to be among the LMD 100’s trailblazers.

Rajan Asirwatham and Sarath Ganegoda hold second position with seven board directorships each while Dr. Sivakumar Selliah ranks third with six directorates.

Meanwhile, National Savings Bank (NSB) Chairperson Dr. Harsha Cabral, Dr. Ravi Fernando, Gamini Gunaratne, industrialist Harry Jayawardena, Chairman of CIC Holdings Harsha Amarasekera, Chairperson of John Keells Holdings Krishan Balendra, and Aitken Spence Joint Deputy Chairman and Managing Director Stasshani Jayawardena also feature on the leaderboard of listed company directors with each holding five seats during the course of financial year 2023/24.

On the women’s directorates list, 22 females occupy at least two board seats while in contrast, the leading men’s listing includes 137 individuals with two directorships.