An interview with Paul DeNicola
The Conference Board Governance Center

Introduction

Good corporate governance is a key element of successful businesses and markets. If companies have in place the structures necessary to operate with fairness, accountability, transparency, and responsibility, they not only ensure the sustainability of their own performance, but also help to improve the business environment as a whole. In order to advance good corporate governance around the world, research is needed to identify and disseminate best practices.

The Conference Board Governance Center gathers a distinguished group of senior corporate executives from leading world-class companies and influential institutional investors. They come together to debate, develop, and advance innovative governance practices in a non-adversarial, confidential setting. The work of this unique forum drives new research in corporate governance, helping companies enhance their governance processes in today’s global marketplace. In this interview with CIPE, the Governance Center Director Paul DeNicola discusses the significance of corporate governance reforms in the context of the global financial crisis.

CIPE: You are the Director of the Governance Center at The Conference Board. What is the main mission of your organization?

Paul DeNicola (PD): The Conference Board is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. The Governance Center, which was founded in 1993, has a mission of simultaneously creating research and setting up educational programs for corporate executives and directors to disseminate that research, and impart and advance best practices in the corporate governance arena.

Through our research and programs, we issue reports on emerging corporate governance issues and best practices, and work with companies and investors on communication and engagement. Our goal is to enable companies to engage with their investors and to work in those parts of the world with a less developed set of corporate governance standards, to enhance and build upon those structures. The Conference Board is known for its objective and empirical research and for the fact that as an organization, we are non-advocacy and apolitical.

The Conference Board main offices are in New York; we also have a European office in Brussels and a center in China, and we have done significant work in India. Over the last 15 or so years, we have educated boards of publicly traded companies in the United States and Europe in corporate governance. We have also done quite a bit of training and education for privately held companies, for family-controlled companies, and for companies in emerging markets, notably in areas like Egypt, India, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Singapore. We look at governance from a global perspective.

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Paul DeNicola is the Director of The Conference Board Governance Center. For over 90 years, The Conference Board has created and disseminated knowledge about management and the marketplace to help businesses strengthen their performance and better serve society. The Conference Board operates as a global independent membership organization working in the public interest. It publishes information and analysis, makes economics-based forecasts and assesses trends, and facilitates learning by creating dynamic communities of interest that bring together senior executives from around the world.