Roger L. Martin - Shareholder Value Versus Corporate
Responsibility
Corporate Responsibility
Article on the delicate balance: Can companies provide good returns to shareholders while
being socially responsible?
Roger L. Martin, the
Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, thinks
they can and should, stating that corporate responsibility can actually
increase shareholder value.
Many consumers and
investors, as well as a growing number of business leaders, have added their
voices to those urging corporations to remember their obligations to their
employees, their communities, and the environment, even as they pursue
profits for shareholders.
But executives who wish to make their organizations better corporate
citizens face significant obstacles. If they undertake costly initiatives
that their rivals don't embrace, they risk eroding their
competitive
position. If they invite government oversight, they may find themselves
hampered by regulations that impose onerous costs without generating
meaningful societal benefits in return. And if they insist on adopting the
wage scales and working conditions that prevail in the world's wealthiest
industrial democracies, they may succeed only in driving jobs to countries
where less stringent standards are the norm.
More on Corporate Responsibility:
de Jonge,
The value of a corporation: shareholder
and stakeholder thinking
Kennedy, The End of Shareholder Value
Freeman, Corporate Strategy and
the Search for Ethics
Shareholder Value Magazine
Center Economic Social
Justice CESJ employees, labor unions, company
Governance
responsibilities accounting standards
Global Corporate Governance Forum
standards governance corporations, enterprise accountability fairness
transparency responsibility
CSR Europe corporate social responsibility
stakeholder dialogue
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