Guiding Principles of Corporate Governance

The IIA should be congratulated for its recent publication, prepared in collaboration with the Neel Corporate Governance Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, of Guiding Principles of Corporate Governance.

I still prefer the King Code IV from the Institute of Directors, Southern Africa, because it is more thorough. But the IIA document is definitely worth reading.

One area that I think is weaker than I would like is in defining requirements for the information provided so that the board can monitor performance. Principle 6 doesn’t go nearly far enough for me. The board needs to know promptly when there is an obstacle in reality or likelihood to achieving objectives. It should know about significant events or situations that could affect the interests of stakeholders, whether it be a reputation or perception issue, activities by competitors, and so on.

A report like this would benefit significantly from a study of the incidence and severity of governance failures. Has anybody seen something reliable and recent?

I welcome your thoughts.

What do you like in the IIA guidance? How could it be improved?

Is it sufficient to use as a foundation for a model of governance…