In collaboration with the World Economic Forum, Baker McKenzie has launched a new whitepaper entitled, “The Future of the Corporation: Moving from Balance Sheet to Value Sheet.”
Covid-19 has brought renewed pressure and scrutiny to companies to ensure they are considering the needs of all those stakeholders impacted by or who can impact their businesses for long-term value creation. The white paper provides analysis about the important role boardrooms and corporate governance play in addressing the environmental, social and governance (ESG) challenges their companies face. Focusing on the need for corporate leaders to move from words to action, the paper provides a set of actions, a stakeholder governance framework, which boardrooms and the executive can take to deliver on their company’s purpose and its stakeholder expectations.
This stakeholder governance framework can help investors, corporate boards and management executives consider which practical tools from the whitepaper they will use to navigate the challenges of implementing stakeholder capitalism and proactively manage upcoming ESG risks and opportunities. There is not a “one-size-fits-all” approach to stakeholder governance. Instead, each company must embark on its own stakeholder governance journey. In particular, the paper highlights the importance of a sense of ‘purpose’ and of aligning company incentives, increasing board diversity and skillset and adopting a common set business-relevant stakeholder capitalism metrics to measure and proactively manage the impact on their business of global challenges related to business, society and the planet.
