Corporate Governance
In a commercial organisation, the board of directors is typically charged with the key responsibility for corporate governance – protecting the rights of shareholders and creditors, ensuring contractual obligations and regulatory compliance.
In the public sector, the elected government is typically responsible for corporate governance, and in semi-government and statutory bodies like State Rail, Sydney
Water, the Australian Broadcasting Authority, the University of NSW, etc – and in not- for-profit organisations – governments will usually mandate a body similar to a board of directors with the responsibility for corporate governance.
What does corporate governance involve?
In a recent article, Gomez & Korine (2005, pp. 739-752) propose that:
Corporate governance can be understood as a set of contracts that defines the relationships among the three principal actors in the corporation.
To simplify what this actually means, corporate governance is the set of relationships where: •A key stakeholder whom they refer to as the sovereign (in the case of commercial organisations this would be the shareholders; in the case of public sector agencies, the elected government; for not-for-profit organisations this is often the ‘members’ or other key stakeholders as defined by legislation)
•sets in place a governing body (eg, board, council, senate, etc) with responsibility for overseeing the actions of the governer (management, staff, employees, volunteers, players, etc)
Increasingly, societies and governments are reacting to a rapidly changing world surrounding them, and modifying the regulations affecting ‘corporate governance’ accordingly. The numbers and interests of stakeholders who are affected by the actions of organisations is expanding. Organisations are being seen to impact on:
the economy the natural environment society through opportunities for work and employment conditions of work family life, etc
Consequently,
In the public sector, the elected government is typically responsible for corporate governance, and in semi-government and statutory bodies like State Rail, Sydney
Water, the Australian Broadcasting Authority, the University of NSW, etc – and in not- for-profit organisations – governments will usually mandate a body similar to a board of directors with the responsibility for corporate governance.
What does corporate governance involve?
In a recent article, Gomez & Korine (2005, pp. 739-752) propose that:
Corporate governance can be understood as a set of contracts that defines the relationships among the three principal actors in the corporation.
To simplify what this actually means, corporate governance is the set of relationships where: •A key stakeholder whom they refer to as the sovereign (in the case of commercial organisations this would be the shareholders; in the case of public sector agencies, the elected government; for not-for-profit organisations this is often the ‘members’ or other key stakeholders as defined by legislation)
•sets in place a governing body (eg, board, council, senate, etc) with responsibility for overseeing the actions of the governer (management, staff, employees, volunteers, players, etc)
Increasingly, societies and governments are reacting to a rapidly changing world surrounding them, and modifying the regulations affecting ‘corporate governance’ accordingly. The numbers and interests of stakeholders who are affected by the actions of organisations is expanding. Organisations are being seen to impact on:
the economy the natural environment society through opportunities for work and employment conditions of work family life, etc
Consequently,