Women on Corporate Boards of Directors: A Needed Resource

This research reports the results of a study of women serving on boards of directors of Canadian private and public sector organizations. These women (N = 278) were an impressive and talented group (eduction, professional designations). In addition, they brought a variety of backgrounds and expertise to their director responsibilities. Most were nominated as a result of recommendations from current board members, CEOs, or someone who knew board members or CEOs. Thus personal relationships (the old boy's network) as well as track records and appropriate expertise were important factors in board nominations. Women directors thought they had some influence on women's issues with their boards and board companies. A majority believed that board members should be more diverse, including more women and fewer male CEOs. However they indicated several barriers faced by women in being selected and nominated for board appointments.     

Women on Corporate Boards of Directors and their Influence on Corporate Philanthropy

This study examined the relationship between the proportion of women serving on firms' boards of directors and the extent to which these same firms engaged in charitable giving activities. Using a sample of 185 Fortune500 firms for the 1991–1994 time period, the results provide strong support for the notion that firms having a higher proportion of women serving on their boards do engage in charitable giving to a greater extent than firms having a lower proportion of women serving on their boards. Further, the results suggest a link between the percentage of women on boards and firm philanthropy in the areas of community service and the arts, but found no link between women boardmembers and firm giving to support education or public policy issues. The implications of the findings and some areas for future research are discussed.     

Corporate Social Responsibility and NGO Directors on Boards

Journal of Business Ethics - In the years 2009 to 2016, approximately 35% of Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 firms had at least one director with a professional background in...     

Women in the Boardroom: How Do Female Directors of Corporate Boards Perceive Boardroom Dynamics?

This study investigated how female directors of corporate boards of directors (BoD) experience boardroom dynamics. The study represents an initial research trend that moves from a unilateral focus on financial outcomes of female representation in BoDs toward stronger attention on the social dynamics in the boardroom. Drawing on social identity theory, the study proposed that female directors often constitute an out-group within the BoD, preventing them from experiencing positive board dynamics. More specifically, the study explored the extent to which female directors do experience less justice, lower cohesion, and higher levels of conflicts within the BoD than their male counterparts do. Moreover, we assumed that female directors with nontraditional educational backgrounds would be particularly likely to experience negative boardroom dynamics whereas female chairpersons of BoDs would perceive boardroom dynamics more positively than other female directors. The sample consisted of 491 directors from 149 BoDs. Our findings revealed that there were generally few differences in the way female and male directors experienced boardroom dynamics and female chairpersons of BoDs did not perceive the dynamics differently than other female directors. Female directors with nontraditional educational backgrounds perceived the boardroom dynamics somewhat more negatively than other female directors, but the differences were not statistically significant. The conclusions from this study are that there are reasons to believe that female directors are welcomed into boardrooms, not perceived as out-groups, and BoDs are able to benefit from the female directors’ experience and skills.     

The Ultimate Glass Ceiling Revisited: The Presence of Women on Corporate Boards

Has the diversity of corporate boards of directors improved? Should it? What role does diversity play in reducing corporate wrongdoing? Will diversity result in a more focused board of directors or more board autonomy? Examining the state of Tennessee as a case study, the authors collected data on the board composition of publicly traded corporations and compared those data to an original study conducted in 1995. Data indicate only a modest improvement in board diversity. This article discusses reasons for the scarcity of women on boards and concludes that, to enhance strategic decisions, board membership should reflect the corporation's consumer population. Thus, women are a critical but overlooked resource. Areas for future research are also considered.     

Female Institutional Directors on Boards and Firm Value

In this paper, we examine the relationship between the environmental practices and implied cost of equity. Using a comprehensive sample of 23,301 firm–year observations from 43 countries, we find that an improvement in environmental practices leads to reduction of the implied cost of equity. Further, the results are stronger in countries where country-level governance is weak. Our results indicate that most of the benefits come from the reduction of emission and unnecessary wastage of resources. Our results remain robust to alternative specifications and endogeneity concerns.     

Critical Mass of Women on BODs, Multiple Identities, and Corporate Philanthropic Disaster Response: Evidence from Privately Owned Chinese Firms

Although previous studies focus on the role of women in the boardroom and corporate response to natural disasters, none evaluate how women directors influence corporate philanthropic disaster response (CPDR). This study collects data on the philanthropic responses of privately owned Chinese firms to the Wenchuan earthquake of May 12, 2008, and the Yushu earthquake of April 14, 2010. We find that when at least three women serve on a board of directors (BOD), their companies’ responses to natural disasters are more significant. Age diversity among women on BODs as well as good corporate profitability (e.g., high earnings per share) positively moderates the relationship between women on BODs and CPDR.     

From Social Pacts to Productivity Boards

Market solutions can be a way for small deregulated states like the Baltics to grow, but they are not a viable path for the EMU area as a whole or for the larger countries like France, Germany or Italy. As most of the challenges have to be addressed at the national level only, an interaction of flexible institutions (as the social pacts were) in coordination with developing European institutions (like a European unemployment scheme) can offer a more stable environment for growth.     

从跑马圈地的广域覆盖到定位明确的有效覆盖——卫视频道经营策略的新研究

<正>目前多数省级卫视都已经达到一定程度的全国性覆盖,但是在这一过程中也遇到了很多大的问题,如覆盖成本越来越高而难以承受;所覆盖的某些城市只有很低的收视率而没有广告的回报,从而在总体上无法达到收支平衡;许多广告公司,尤其是大的4A公司并不按照待评估卫视的覆盖效果,而是按照收视效果来决定投放。     

Female Presence on Corporate Boards: A Multi-Country Study of Environmental Context

A growing body of ethics research investigates gender diversity and governance on corporate boards, at individual and firm levels, in single country studies. In this study, we explore the environmental context of female representation on corporate boards of directors, using data from 43 countries. We suggest that women’s representation on corporate boards may be shaped by the larger environment, including the social, political and economic structures of individual countries. We use logit regression to conduct our analysis. Our results indicate that countries with higher representation of women on boards are more likely to have women in senior management and more equal ratios of male to female pay. However, we find that countries with a longer tradition of women’s political representation are less likely to have high levels of female board representation.     

Women Board Directors: Characteristics of the Few

Appointment as a director of a company board often represents the pinnacle of a management career. Worldwide, it has been noted that very few women are appointed to the boards of directors of companies. Blame for the low numbers of women of company boards can be partly attributed to the widely publicized "glass ceiling". However, the very low representation of women on company boards requires further examination. This article reviews the current state of women's representation on boards of directors and summarizes the reasons as to why women are needed on company boards. Given that more women on boards are desirable, the article then describes how more women could be appointed to boards, and the actions that organizations and women could take to help increase the representation of women. Finally, the characteristics of those women that have succeeded in becoming members of company boards are described from an international perspective. Unfortunately, answers to the vexing question of whether these women have gained board directorships in their own right as extremely competent managers, or whether they are mere token female appointments in a traditional male dominated culture, remains elusive.     

Moral Reasoning and Ethical Climate: Not-for-Profit vs. For-Profit Boards of Directors

Utilizing Rest's moral development and Victor and Cullen's ethical climate surveys, we examine differences in moral reasoning and ethical climate between board members in the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors. Six for-profit corporations and seven not-for-profit corporations, all with base operations in a major midwestern state, participated in the study. We find that profit and not-for-profit boards may not differ in moral reasoning, but do exhibit different types of ethical climates. We also find that for-profit board members may utilize higher stages of reasoning a greater percentage of the time than not-for-profit directors. In contrast, the ethical climates of the two types of organizations are significantly different. For-profit companies had climates higher in egoism than did not-for-profit companies. In addition, not-for-profit firms reflected higher benevolence factors than for-profit firms. Not-forprofit organizations also had somewhat higher, but not significantly different, mean scores on the principle factor compared to the for-profit organizations.     

Corporate Directors and Social Responsibility: Ethics versus Shareholder Value

This paper reports on the results of an experiment conducted with experienced corporate directors. The study findings indicate that directors employ prospective rationality cognition, and they sometimes make decisions that emphasize legal defensibility at the expense of personal ethics and social responsibility. Directors recognize the ethical and social implications of their decisions, but they believe that current corporate law requires them to pursue legal courses of action that maximize shareholder value. The results suggest that additional ethics education will have little influence on the decisions of many business leaders because their decisions are driven by corporate law, rather than personal ethics. Jacob Rose is Associate Professor at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. His research emphasizes judgment and decision making in accounting and governance contexts.     

Corporate Social Responsibility Audit: From Theory to Practice

This research examines the possibility of developing a new corporate social responsibility (CSR) auditing system based on the analysis of current CSR literature and interviews conducted with a number of interested and knowledgeable stakeholders. This work attempts to create a framework for social responsibility auditing compatible with an existing commercially successful environmental audit system. The project is unusual in that it tackles the complex issue of CSR auditing with a scientific approach using Grounded Theory. On the evidence discovered to date in the literature review and the interviews, CSR seems to be perceived by many as the social strand of sustainable development. However, there is far less agreement regarding its measurement. Both the literature review and the interview analysis indicate that developing an applied CSR auditing procedure will be a challenging task. This is principally due to the lack of formal study of this complex subject, which, despite the widespread debate it has engendered, still lacks a single and broadly accepted definition. The concepts developed from the findings of this research, together with the key factors identified in a literature review of CSR, were developed into a prospective CSR audit protocol.     

从科学管理到公司治理

本文认为,管理理论与实践的发展有其内在轨迹,即企业管理学的研究重心依次从一线人员、中级管理人员转移到高级管理人员。其重心转移过程是期望与现实之间的动态平衡过程,而实现这一平衡的主要手段是标准化管理即“广义科学管理”。考虑到标准化本身存在的缺陷以及我国企业无论在一线员工还是高层管理人员层面上都存在标准化管理工作虚位的情况,文章提出,为了促进我国企业管理的进步,应实施渐进的标准化建设过程,依照自身的认识规律和实践过程,逐次逐级建立和完善标准化管理,其对象依次为一线人员、中级管理人员和高级管理人员,特殊情况下,也不排除同时在三个层次上发生“革命式”进展。     

From Management Systems to Corporate Social Responsibility

At the start of the 21st century, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) seems to have great potential for innovating business practices with a positive impact on People, Planet and Profit. In this article the differences between the management systems approach of the nineties, and Corporate Social Responsibility are analysed.An analysis is structured around three business principles that are relevant for CSR and management systems: (1) doing things right the first time, (2) doing the right things, and (3) continuous improvement and innovation. Basically CSR is focussing on the second principle, and management systems focus on the first. However, CSR is very likely to build on the management systems as well.From a CSR point of view, the existing generation of management systems with their focus on rational control (= doing things right) can only be of limited use in the development of CSR. However, the preventive rationalities of management systems are important. Values and the principle doing the right things is extremely relevant for CSR. This goes far beyond the present generation of ISO type management systems; opportunities stem from building on TQM approaches like the EFQM Business Excellence model. Continuous improvement and innovation is a permanent challenge underlying the two other business principles, and requires both individual and organisational learning processes. In the present generation of management systems, continuous improvement mainly addresses rational prevention, barely the value aspects of business.For the further development and implementation of CSR, each of the three business management principles are vital. There is a need for a new generation of management systems that addresses the values at stake in strategic decision-making, both at company level and in the behaviour of individuals, while the rationalities of prevention and anticipation are still relevant. In both directions more emphasis for continuous learning and innovation will be needed.CSR is likely to trigger the development of management systems in the directions mentioned. This will support companies to be credible and transparent in improving the performance with respect to people, planet and profit.     

Increasing the Number of Women on Boards: The Role of Actors and Processes

In this article, we offer an approach of how participative stakeholder innovation can be evaluated in complex multistakeholder settings that address wicked issues. Based on the principle of mutual value creation, we present an evaluation framework that accounts for the social interaction process during which stakeholders integrate their resources and capabilities to develop innovative products and services. To assess this evaluation framework, we collected multiple data from the case study of the Swiss Cardiovascular Network, which represents a multistakeholder setting related to the prevention of cardiovascular disease. Our findings indicate that the evaluation dimensions of the stakeholders’ mindsets, the process and context of the stakeholder interactions, as well as the outcomes are useful concepts to account for a cooperative process of innovation in a multistakeholder setting. We discuss both the theoretical and practical insights of our analysis for participative stakeholder innovation.     

Legislated Ethics: From Enron to Sarbanes-Oxley,the Impact on Corporate America

This paper explores the financial reporting scandals of the past decade and the resulting U.S. legislative attempts to impose ethical behavior and control the incidence of new reporting problems via the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation. We begin with a brief historical perspective followed by assertions of ethical consequences of legislation with discussions of key recent corporate scandals, the motives for the frauds, and the consequences. Ethics related provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act are discussed with the potential impact of the legislation on the likelihood of similar future frauds and accompanying prognosis for future corporate ethical behavior.     

Gender and Ethnic Diversity on Boards and Corporate Responsibility: The Case of the Arts Sector

This study provides insights on sector-specific characteristics, challenges and issues that affect corporate responsibility (CR) in relation to ethnicity and gender on arts boards. Using stakeholder theory, the study explores how arts board composition (e.g. gender and ethnicity) sets the scene for dynamics that affect CR. Data analysis is based on interviews with 92 board members and stakeholders sitting on 66 arts boards in Australia. Results suggest that the dynamism of gender and ethnic diversity on arts boards makes them responsive to CR; however, their presence does not always lead to CR. For diverse boards to lead to CR, our findings indicate the significance of board member attributes of passion, skill and capability of developing networks, irrespective of gender and ethnicity. The article advances understanding of the implications and relevance of ethnic and gender diversity on non-profit boards and contributes to an important yet under-researched body of literature.