Research on functional members of top management teams (TMTs) has increasingly drawn interest to the strategic management field over the past few years. Studies have documented the rise of the chief financial officer (CFO) to pivotal importance and considerable power within the organization. By...

Using a new database that contains accounting data for a large sample of U.S. private firms, we provide an investigation of financial reporting quality (FRQ) of U.S. private versus public firms. We find that in general public firms have higher accrual quality and are more conservative. The...

Using a new database that contains accounting data for a large sample of U.S. private firms, we provide an investigation of financial reporting quality (FRQ) of U.S. private versus public firms. We find that in general public firms have higher accrual quality and are more conservative. The...

For some privately-held firms, the costs of providing high-quality accrual-based financial statements may outweigh the benefits of accommodating the demands of their stakeholders who may rely more on cash flows or have direct access to management. For other private firms, greater stakeholder...

In recent years, regulators have introduced gender diversity quota laws and dis-closure-based approaches to increase the representation of women on corporate boards. These developments have set off a global discussion about the importance of diversity in the boardroom and what role governments...

The chapter continues and advances our earlier research on ‘Board Models in Europe’.** We explore ‘The Structure of the Board of Directors’ with a view to the basic governance structure as provided by a board model vis-à-vis techniques of structuring the decision-making body, which can...

In 2017, “The Big Three” institutional investors launched campaigns to increase gender diversity on corporate boards. We estimate that their campaigns led firms to add at least 2.5 times as many female directors in 2019 as they had in 2016, accounting for most of the increase in board gender...

Can algorithms assist firms in their decisions on nominating corporate directors? Directors predicted to do poorly by algorithms indeed do poorly compared to a realistic pool of candidates in out-of-sample tests. Predictably bad directors are more likely to be male, accumulate more...

In recent years, increasing attention has focused on the influence of gender and racial diversity on boards of directors. Sixteen countries now require quotas to increase women's representation on boards, and many more have voluntary quotas in corporate governance codes. In the United States,...

We examine which independent directors are held accountable when investors sue firms for financial and disclosure related fraud. Investors can name independent directors as defendants in lawsuits, and they can vote against their re-election to express displeasure over the directors'...