‘‘A board composed of directors representing a range of perspectives leads to an environment of collaborative tension that is the essence of good governance. In a room where everyone has different points of view and there is a greater opportunity for cross-pollination of ideas, there are fewer unspoken assumptions, less “group think” and a greater likelihood of innovation. This allows the board to ask the probing questions and tackle the challenging issues, such as risk management and succession planning, which are at the center of good corporate governance.
Tag: Directorship
”Japan changes tax treatment of D&O liability insurance premiums”
”Japan’s National Tax Agency (NTA) has announced a new tax treatment of premiums for directors’ and officers’ liability insurance.
ADB Economics Working Paper Series – ”Women’s Leadership and Corporate Performance” by Meijun Qian
This paper reviews the concept, theory, and international evidence on gender diversity and its relation to financial performance.
”A corporate governance cure-all?”
”A set of new rules unveiled by the Tokyo Stock Exchange requires all companies listed on its First and Second sections to have at least two independent outside directors on their board. The move is in line with the Abe administration’s push to beef up corporate governance as a way of attracting more foreign investors. […]
”Why Can’t Boards Get CEO Succession Right?”
”It’s been 25 years since Professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld’s landmark book The Hero’s Farewell vividly documented the challenges and failures of CEO succession planning at large publicly traded companies, and not much has changed beyond the exponential growth in what the top executives get paid.
”Korea’s Lessons for Japan”
”There’s one thing Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe could learn from a Korean woman: respect — for minority shareholders, that is. President Park Geun Hye’s push for better corporate governance at the nation’s largest conglomerates is bearing fruit, and exciting some of the world’s biggest investors.
Last week, Samsung Electronics, by far the biggest member of the country’s $1 trillion Kospi stock index, adopted a proposal to allow non-CEOs to take up the chairman’s role for the first time, while Hyundai Motor pledged to strengthen transparency. The moves drew praise from Mark Mobius, the executive chairman of Templeton Emerging Markets Group at Franklin Resources. Across the strait, only 1 percent of Japan’s Topix 500 companies have “good” board structures, Jefferies analyst Zuhair Khan said in a note Tuesday.
”Shareholder Activism & Engagement 2016”
”At the end of another record-breaking year for shareholder activism activity, it is appropriate that we ring in the publication of this, the inaugural edition of Shareholder Activism & Engagement, part of the Getting the Deal Through series. We are pleased to serve as editors of this volume because we believe that shareholder activism is and will remain in sharp focus in financial markets, in the C-suite and in the boardroom, and that shareholder engagement is, and will continue to be, a leading and increasingly sophisticated priority. The international approach of the Getting the Deal Through series is especially apt for this topic, which we expect to become increasingly global over time, with ‘imports’ and ‘exports’ of shareholder activism and engagement between jurisdictions. Although the United States remains its dominant market, such activism and a heightened sensitivity to shareholder engagement is truly a global phenomenon.
Bloomberg: (Benes) ”It’s Not Demand Holding Women Back From Joining Japan’s Boards”
div>
-
Women represent just 2.7% of directors of public companies
-
Some worry about ‘overboarding’ by same handful of women
”Sakie Fukushima remembers the novelty of being the only woman on Korn/Ferry International’s board of directors, which she joined in 1995. Ditto when she joined the Sony Corp., Kao Corp. and Benesse Corp. boards years later.
”Japanese Boards in Europe should reflect their customers, employees and community
‘
‘I have just completed the first phase of research into how diverse the European subsidiary boards of the biggest Japanese companies in Europe are, both in terms of the nationality mix of Japanese and European directors, and also the number of women on the board.
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu LLC Survey – “Board Practices in Japan 2016”

For the purpose of contributing to improvements in board effectiveness, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu LLC conducted the survey “Board Practices in Japan 2016”, and invite listed companies to use the results as a benchmark to analyze and evaluate board effectiveness.