Board Agenda, in association with Mazars and INSEAD, asked C-suite executives and non-executives about their preparedness for a pandemic in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, as well as gauging their changing attitude to risk and their views of the current risk environment.

Diligent has hosted over 100 director interviews, virtual roundtables, webinars and podcasts since COVID-19 began. We’ve summed up our findings in a report, which offers a snapshot of corporate boardrooms right now.

An internal investigation must be handled meticulously to avoid legal exposure, regulatory or criminal prosecution and reputational damage, and enable the board to comply with its obligations. This guide seeks to empower company directors in dealings with the authorities should an internal invest...

Whether it’s a lack of engagement or security, poorly executed virtual meetings can lessen productivity, weaken camaraderie, and (most importantly) compromise sensitive information at all levels of an organisation. As video conferences become an increasingly important collaboration tool for board...

The Global Business Complexity Index, sponsored by TMF Group, looks at the complexity of operating businesses in countries around the world. Since the 2018 report, the landscape has become more challenging. Trade disputes, tariffs, rising nationalism and Brexit point to a shift from globalisation to...

The ever-changing corporate landscape is making the AGM season a more uncertain time. In 2020, we are expecting more developments. Challenges will come from increasingly confident investors and proxy advisers whose expectations are likely to be higher than the new codes and standards. To help you...

Board-level risk management activities vary in organisations as a result of internal and external factors. This new report from ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) highlights common challenges and good practices to overcome risk management difficulties. It includes the ‘risk ...

At a time of rapid advances in technology and market transformation, business executives need to be fit for the future, not just for the present. And this is perhaps most important for members of the board, those that are charged with the oversight of the business. In a technology-enabled transfo...

Diversity in the boardroom is now seen as good business practice—supporting enhanced decision-making, market understanding and employee engagement. Regulators and investors see the value in board diversity, and are willing to engage on the issue where weaknesses are identified. There is also a pen...

Financial services firms are facing an unprecedented raft of challenges. The Future-Proofing Financial Services – Insight Report 2019, produced by Board Agenda in partnership with Mazars, looks at the principles of effective governance and board practices within the financial se...

Few developments have been as influential on business as outsourcing. For boards around the world the benefit of outsourcing has moved from simply reducing costs to providing the opportunity for competitive advantage and strategic transformation. Boardroom Insights: The risks & rewards of...

The impact of digital transformation changes virtually every aspect of an organisation, and corporate boards are no exception. As an organisation becomes more agile, reduces cycle times and adopts analytics-driven processes, becoming a real-time entity, so, too, must the board that governs it. This ...

Digital transformation and new technology is rapidly changing each aspect of an organisation, which is greatly impacting how boards operate. Understanding how to use technology to drive more benefit to an organisation is of the utmost importance. Enterprise Governance Management (EGM) is an emerging...

The Board Leadership in Corporate Sustainability: European Report 2018, produced by Mazars and Board Agenda in association with INSEAD Corporate Governance Centre, measures how boards and directors across Europe are leading and managing corporate sustainability, which has become a p...

The Board Leadership in Corporate Culture: European Report 2017, produced by Mazars and Board Agenda in association with INSEAD Corporate Governance Centre, is the first survey of its kind to measure how effective boards and directors across Europe are at leading and managing corporate cultu...

Boards are coming under more scrutiny and pressure than ever before from regulators, investors and the public to be effective and to continually raise their performance. More accountability is called for, which brings further complexity ...

Compliance is becoming more important as a variable that senior decision-makers must consider when choosing international expansion locations. At the same time, legal and tax teams need to know what jurisdictions are complex for handling compliance issues.

Artificial intelligence (AI) warrants the close attention of the board because it presents opportunities when applied well and risks when applied badly. Organisations that successfully exploit AI can disrupt the market, drive growth and manage their commercial risk. Yet, AI technologies also present...

So, in case you missed it, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will come into play in May 2018. This is the biggest shake-up of data-protection laws in decades and will affect every organisation in Europe. With it we see a multitude of obligations that require companies to securely and eff...

Traditional industries are being disrupted by agile, innovative startups faster than ever before. In that context, new and diverse ways of thinking are required for larger and more established organisations to respond to new market dynamics, evolving customer needs and increasingly complex technolog...

The pace and scale of disruption will continue to present a number of challenges to companies; however, opportunities to harness new technology and trends will undoubtedly emerge to reshape business models, improve companies’ performance and value creation, and focus on and address emerging risks....

Email and print should now be a thing of the past for board communications, in large part due to the security risks they pose. While technology is changing the way everyone does business today, research has found that boards can often be surprisingly slow to protect confidential data and conversatio...

Mazars and ecoDa highlight key challenges facing European corporate governance systems A quarter of a century since the world’s first corporate governance code, Mazars and ecoDa report the headline findings from a survey of 130 listed ...

In today’s competitive economy, it is critical for board members to actively and productively participate in the work of governing. Exceptional director performance is vital in order for a corporate board to be effective and for an organisation’s goals to be achieved. The white paper ‘

In this new survey report, the research team conducted interviews with professional chairs in different parts of the world to identify and compare specific practices and instruments used in different countries. The report gives insights into pertinent issues surrounding the work of the chair across...

The IFC Corporate Governance Group (World Bank) in partnership with ecoDa have just published a Guide to Corporate Governance Practices of the European Union. This publication offers an overview of the changes taking place across the EU’s corporate governance landscape. It provides a focused exam...

ECI has fostered ethics and compliance (E&C) professionals with insight and research on the most pressing issues to the E&C industry since 1922, and this new report importantly underscores the critical role management plays in reducing stakeholder pressure to compromise their ethical standar...

Effective communication lies at the heart of a high-performing board. How members of the board communicate with each other can either be an enabler or a highly destructive force if not properly managed. Clear, transparent and timely communication by boards is essential.   ...

Yet another misconduct scandal has hit a major financial institution. This time the bank in question, Wells Fargo, was considered best in class having sailed through the financial crisis relatively unscathed and, as a result, boasting the best bank valuation among its global peers. So, what gover...

Whether you are part of a European company or a non-European company that trades or stores data inside Europe, it is likely that the new European data protection regulations coming into play will affect the way you handle employee and customer data. So how do you prepare for the upcomi...

We are delighted to introduce our first issue of Global Tax Insight, our biannual publication in which we cover key topical tax issues from around the globe. Its timing could not have been more propitious, following the UK’s referendum vote to leave the European Union. This surprise ...

Mazars’ head of board practice, Anthony Carey, has released this thought-provoking document on the importance of board culture and its role in achieving sustainable success. In it, he identifies four broa...

This article, published in 2016, is part of the Broadridge Insights series. Governance has emerged as the signature risk of the post-financial crisis era in Europe. The great recession brought in its wake costly bank failures, bailouts, and write-offs of bad debts, followed by tense ...

The Board Charter. For Sustainable Success® is designed to be used alongside existing corporate governance codes and is aimed at boards striving for sustainable success for their stakeholders and wider society. In this second ...

Today’s board confronts significant oversight accountability – alongside personal liability – that’s part and parcel of an increasingly complex compliance landscape. What’s more, the uptick in shareholder activism means boards now need to evaluate deals and...

InfraRead is our biannual publication covering a range of legal and transactional issues relevant to the global transport and infrastructure space. In this issue, we look at Port developments in AsiaPac: A platform for regional growth and global trade; Riding the wave: Australian stud...

In our previous issue of Credit Funds INSIGHT, we put the spotlight on the sea change in non-bank lending, as banking monopoly restrictions began to be loosened across Europe. As 2016 is looking to be another robust year for the private debt sector with strong growth in the marketing o...

We are delighted to introduce this seventeenth issue of EnergySource, our biannual publication in which we cover a range of legal and transactional issues relevant to the energy sector from our offices across the globe.

The Sustainability Board Report has developed an organisational framework that taps into the power of purpose, individual management style and fosters outcomes that benefit all stakeholders.

This report looks at the case for international and cultural diversity in businesses and introduces a new tool, the Global Future Diversity Index, which shows how top companies fare on this dimension. It also presents an update on progress with respect to gender and ethnic diversity.

Business email compromise (BEC) has overtaken ransomware and data breach by hackers as the main driver of AIG EMEA cyber claims, according to the latest statistics. Professional services is now the sector hardest hit by cyber claims, followed by financial services. However, incidents continue to ...

This report assesses the technologies having most impact on the audit profession as we know it today. Drawing on existing research and exploring the views of leading practitioners, it provides an understanding of how the changing business environment is shaping technological change in auditing. It a...

Over the past five years, there has been a dramatic increase in the attention paid by financial policymakers to sustainability issues. Accompanying, and in some markets, leading this change, institutional investors have actively engaged with policymakers on sustainability issues. The PRI monitors...

The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) wanted to better understand the views of the general public who, as investors in shares, on their own account or in ISAs or pensions, or as customers or employees of businesses, have a stake in the work of the regulator. This report looks at citizens’ views...

The climate crisis, declining natural resources, and pollution affect us all. We need to make our economic system sustainable now, to be able to face these imminent threats. Corporate governance is instrumental to change how businesses are run and can be a main driver of a sustainable economy. Board...

The Hampton-Alexander Review is an independent, business-led review supported by Government, which builds on the success of the Davies Review. In 2016 it set a series of recommendations aimed at increasing the number of women in leadership positions of FTSE 350 companies. The Review scope captures 2...

Delivering through Diversity both tackles the business case and provides a perspective on how to take action on inclusion and diversity to impact growth and business performance. This latest research reaffirms the global relevance of the correlation between diversity (defined here as a grea...

The boardrooms of Britain’s leading public companies do not reflect the ethnic diversity of either the UK or the stakeholders that they seek to engage and represent. This report highlights that ethnic minority representation in the boardrooms across the FTSE 100 is disproportionately low, especial...