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The Most Influential People in Corporate Governance

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Each year, the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) publishes the Directorship 100 — a “combination of leading corporate directors, corporate governance practitioners and public policy leaders who are recognized as the most influential people in the boardroom and the corporate governance arena.”

The NACD Directorship surveyed 15,000 public company directors and executives to form the final 100 honorees.

“The esteemed boardroom leaders on the Directorship 100 share a common characteristic as proactive agents of change in the boardroom community, shaping the future of corporate governance at a time when American business looks to restore investor confidence and restore economic growth,” said NACD CEO and President Ken Daly.

Among the top 100 honored are a select group of D&O insurers and governance advisors, including:

  • Robert C. Cox, Chubb Group
  • Mark Lamendola, Travelers
  • Timothy J. O’Donnell, ACE USA
  • Daniel W. Riordan, Zurich Financial Services
  • Michael W. Smith, Chartis
  • Richard A. Bennett, The Corporate Library
  • Gavin Anderson, GovernanceMetrics International
  • Steve Harvey, Martha Carter, Carol Bowie, Patrick S. McGurn, ISS Governance Services
  • Robert McCormick, Glass Lewis & Co.

The association noted that it has seen a shift in the type of leader exerting the most influence on corporate governance. For the first time, professionals in the “regulators and rule makers” category received the most nominations.

America’s Most Trustworthy Companies

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For the fourth straight year, Forbes has unveiled its list of America’s 100 Most Trustworthy Companies and, as Reactions pointed out, three property/casualty insurers not only made the cut, but received perfect scores: Montpelier Re, Greenlight Capital and National Interstate.

The other insurance firms in the top 100 were: Chubb, Arch, Renaissance Re, Transatlantic, FPIC, Safety Insurance Group, EMC and Navigators. Here is the full list, which includes Bed, Bath & Beyond, Hess and Lowe’s in the “large cap” division.

For the rankings, Forbes partners with Audit Integrity, and in the write up, they were quick to kick another insurance giant while it is down in an attempt to show how their past predictions have proven true.

Audit Integrity looks beyond the raw data on companies’ income statements and balance sheets to assess the true quality of corporate accounting and management practices. As early as August 2005, Audit Integrity’s proprietary rating system signaled potential problems at Lehman Brothers. In December of 2005 it gave American International Group a significant downgrade.

Awww. Poor AIG. Always getting made fun of for helping tank the economy.

They also note some of the rationale behind the list, which is directly in line with a core tenant of risk mitigation: avoid negative events.

Audit Integrity’s evaluation penalizes companies for unusual or excessive executive compensation, high levels of management turnover, substantial insider trading relative to their corporate peers or high levels of short-term executive compensation, which encourages management to focus on short-term results. Good housekeeping practices leave companies better prepared to handle an economic downturn, especially one as severe as right now. The absence of negative events counts, as much as the existence of positive events, in getting businesses on the list. “These companies have made it through our screening process and shown consistent high quality,” Zwingli says. “Healthy individuals are often that way because they don’t engage in unhealthy behavior. These companies are the same way.”

What’s the saying?

“All news is good news.”

Yeah, I don’t think that is true for companies. And apparently, neither do Audit Integrity and Forbes.

In related news, Greenwich Associates recently released its “Excellence Awards for Middle Market Insurance Brokerage.”