Do level, field, and place of board members' Education impact financial risk disclosure? A Saudi Empirical evidence

This study aims to investigate the effect of board attributes (level, field, and place of education) on corporate financial risk disclosure in the Saudi energy sector. The research focuses on four energy companies listed between 2009 and 2021, resulting in 52 firm-year observations. Panel regressions were implemented to control for heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation. The study's results revealed that education level positively influences financial risk disclosure, whereas the impacts of place and field of education are not well-established. Moreover, the study explored the moderating role of education attributes in financial risk disclosure, indicating that companies with fewer highly educated board members who received their education from foreign universities other than those in Saudi Arabia are more inclined to disclose financial risks transparently. These findings suggest an essential need to diversify the level and place of education among directors, which holds significant implications for corporate governance policy-makers.

When CEO Pay Becomes a Brand Problem

For over four decades, the topic of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) compensation has attracted considerable attention from the fields of economics, finance, management, public policy, law, and business ethics. As scholarly interest in CEO pay has increased, so has public concern about the ethics of high CEO pay. Despite growing interest and pressure among the public and government to reduce CEO pay, it has continued to increase. Using a multi-method design incorporating a pilot study, two online experiments, and an event study, we investigate the impact of CEO pay on consumer purchase intent and find that this negative relationship is magnified under conditions of brand crisis. We also find that the negative interaction of high CEO pay and brand crisis on purchase intent is more negative when the brand has strong equity. Finally, when the CEO is awarded high pay while the firm they manage is undergoing a brand crisis, consumers lose trust in the firm's brand which reduces consumer purchase intent. This research provides insight on how governance decisions can impact consumer perceptions of corporate brands and consumer behavior, with implications for public policy leaders, boards of directors, CEOs, and Chief Marketing Officers regarding how to manage and message CEO pay.

Which internal corporate governance mechanisms drive corporate sustainability?

DESIGN

/methodology/approach: This study conducts a systematic review to analyze the relationship between corporate governance and corporate sustainability.

PURPOSE

As enterprises are directed through corporate governance, the integration of corporate sustainability is a necessary step to secure long-term firm success and react to recent social and environmental developments. Against this background, this paper investigates the following research question: Which internal corporate governance mechanisms drive corporate sustainability?

FINDINGS

The results gained from a sample of 56 articles show findings for different internal corporate governance mechanisms such as board diversity, board independence, the board size, the board-level sustainability committee, the role of the CEO, ownership concentration, and the disclosure and transparency practice, which play a role in guiding a firm in a sustainable direction and achieving sustainability integration. The role of board diversity is discussed the most throughout the literature.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS

The results suggest that boards should be designed diversely and independently while having an appropriate size to work effectively. Furthermore, the sustainability strategies of CEOs should be motivated by incentives. Nevertheless, there has to be a consideration of the interrelations of the investigated mechanisms.

SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS

The results suggest that being more transparent and showing non-financial performance at least compliant to sustainability regulations increases the orientation on stakeholder interests and long-term focus.

ORIGINALITY/VALUE

The paper systemizes the research field related to internal corporate governance mechanisms and corporate sustainability to give an overview of the current research landscape and discuss the identified drivers. Overall, this research comprehensively sketches of what is known and unknown about the questions addressed in the systematic review.

Board effects on innovation in family and non-family business

This paper contributes to the corporate governance and innovation literature by providing empirical evidence with respect to the influence of composition of the board and its leadership structure on innovation. Also, this study seeks to investigate if such influence differs when comparing family and non-family business. Data were collected from 86 Spanish companies of innovative sectors from 2003 to 2014. The results show that innovation is affected positively by board size, especially in the case of family businesses, and gender diversity, especially in non-family businesses. Similarly, findings also point out that duality is better than the independence of functions in the case of non-family businesses. Finally, obtained results support that independent directors have a negative impact on innovation and such negative influence is even stronger in family firms. These findings contribute to an inconclusive literature regarding board effects on innovation, highlighting different recommendations depending on whether the companies are family businesses or not.

Comprehensive dataset for corporate governance in Oman: Data for a three-level quality assessment of corporate governance

This article describes a dataset on firm-level corporate governance (CG) mechanisms in the Sultanate of Oman. It incorporates, in cross-sectional time series (pooled panel) data, eleven variables: corporate governance quality, board of directors’ quality, audit committee quality, board independence, board expertise, board size, board meetings, audit committee independence, audit committee expertise, audit committee size, and audit committee meetings. The dataset is derived from 1540 firm-year observations for the period 2005 to 2017, excluding financial firms (482) and firms with missing data (29), resulting in a final sample of 1029 firm-year observations. The data were extracted from six sources: OSIRIS database, CG reports, Google, firm's website, directors’ websites, and Bloomberg. Scholarly researchers can readily use this dataset as two data types were created to allow individual and composite measurements of corporate governance mechanisms. The individual determinants are: board independence, board expertise, board size, board meetings, audit committee independence, audit committee expertise, audit committee size, and audit committee meetings. The composite measurements are: corporate governance quality, board of directors’ quality, and audit committee quality. This dataset could be used for investigating corporate governance mechanisms in different business and market issues.

Using 501c3 Foundations in the Care of Cleft and Craniofacial Children

This article relates to the use of 501c3 foundations in the care of patients with cleft and craniofacial disorders. Both authors are medical directors and founders of foundations that serve these children: A Smile for a Child Foundation was set up to help children locally; Free to Smile was set up as an international missions foundation. This article explores the advantages and disadvantages of each type of foundation as well as the struggles and successes foundations face to help children locally and internationally.