ESG rhetoric pledge regrets. With ESG becoming as important to some companies as EBITDA and marketing departments ramping up the ESG rhetoric, the effective scope of dutiful oversight has expanded…The Delaware court increasingly sees oversight of all things mission-critical as a board duty.
“For the first time since its landmark Caremark decision, the Delaware Chancery Court has allowed a breach of oversight claim to proceed against a corporate officer when it declined to dismiss claims brought by stockholders against David Fairhurst, McDonald’s former head of human resources…”.[kos] The bottom line is that law and society are expecting better management and oversight—a touch of common sense many would say—and that disappointment (read, shift in expectations leading to anger and disappointment, aka, reputation crisis) is playing out in the courts….Companies and boards need a solid, universally applicable management and oversight process that is forward-looking to manage risk strategically. The quality of that process needs to be proactively authenticated with insurance. Compliance-focused controls, which by design are backward looking—and the audits that authenticate them—are necessary but with the evolving expectations of society, apparently no longer sufficient.
Reputation resilience vs. reputation loss. (V)oters have a record of dumping UK governments that lose their reputation for economic competence, even at elections some years later. Truss faces a monumental struggle to convince her own MPs she is capable of rehabilitating her own and her party’s image, and of leading Britain forward. If they conclude she cannot — and some seem already to have made up their minds — they may move against her quickly.
Regardless of one’s moral compass, the practical risks of failing to uphold business ethics are very real, transcending any legal or regulatory requirements. A company’s most valuable asset may be its reputation, yet that asset appears nowhere on the company’s balance sheet. Board members’ oversight of risk management should therefore include reputational risk as a key element, which requires attention to business ethics throughout the company’s activities, both current and planned. This book provides excellent examples — good and bad — that will be instructive for board members in overseeing management of reputational risk.
Ethics Compliance Management Governance. An effective management process for [ethics, compliance, ESG risk, reputation risk…] creates value with regulators. An effective governance process creates value with investors and the courts. Auditors’ reports on controls are how boards can signal to regulators that their management processes are effective. Reputation and ESG insurances are how boards can …
