There is no substitute for a culture of integrity in organizations. Compliance alone with the law is not enough. History shows that those who make a practice of skating close to the edge always wind up going over the line. A higher bar of ethics performance is necessary. That bar needs to be set and monitored in the boardroom.  ~J. Richard Finlay writing in The Globe and Mail.

Sound governance is not some abstract ideal or utopian pipe dream. Nor does it occur by accident or through sudden outbreaks of altruism. It happens when leaders lead with integrity, when directors actually direct and when stakeholders demand the highest level of ethics and accountability.  ~ J. Richard Finlay in testimony before the Standing Committee on Banking, Commerce and the Economy, Senate of Canada.

The Finlay Centre for Corporate & Public Governance is the longest continuously cited voice on modern governance standards. Our work over the course of four decades helped to build the new paradigm of ethics and accountability by which many corporations and public institutions are judged today.

The Finlay Centre was founded by J. Richard Finlay, one of the world’s most prescient voices for sound boardroom practices, sanity in CEO pay and the ethical responsibilities of trusted leaders. He coined the term stakeholder capitalism in the 1980s.

We pioneered the attributes of environmental responsibility, social purposefulness and successful governance decades before the arrival of ESG. Today we are trying to rebuild the trust that many dubious ESG practices have shattered. 

 

We were the first to predict seismic boardroom flashpoints and downfalls and played key roles in regulatory milestones and reforms.

We’re working to advance the agenda of the new boardroom and public institution of today: diversity at the table; ethics that shine through a culture of integrity; the next chapter in stakeholder capitalism; and leadership that stands as an unrelenting champion for all stakeholders.

Our landmark work in creating what we called a culture of integrity and the ethical practices of trusted organizations has been praised, recognized and replicated around the world.

 

Our rich institutional memory, combined with a record of innovative thinking for tomorrow’s challenges, provide umatached resources to corporate and public sector players.

Trust is the asset that is unseen until it is shattered.  When crisis hits, we know a thing or two about how to rebuild trust— especially in turbulent times.

We’re still one of the world’s most recognized voices on CEO pay and the role of boards as compensation credibility gatekeepers. Somebody has to be.

Recent changes only confirm that the  company  remains in denial

We are quoted in this week’s cover story of Maclean’s on the RIM fiasco. Regular readers will know that Finlay ON Governance has been on this story for several years and has long predicted the kind of stock meltdown and leadership turmoil that has rocked the company.  The co-founders’ decision to step aside from the co-CEO slot, but not out of the boardroom, and the appointment of an insider to CEO with an old-guard director moving up as chair of the board, do not change our views.

The Maclean’s piece presents a good overview of some of the failures but is a little short on the root cause, which we have long contended is RIM’s dysfunctional system of corporate governance.  Here are some further thoughts on that subject and why the recent management changes are unlikely to produce the results investors would like.

The fact that RIM’s top management and board could take so long to come up with so little just shows how far out of touch they remain.  It’s obvious that Balsillie and Lazaridis wanted their guy in the top spot and do not grasp why shareholders were looking for more than a marionette whose strings they can pull any time.

What is really alarming is that independent directors think this will work, when a clean break with a strong new CEO at the helm, plus a fresh outsider as board chair  — unaccompanied by RIM’s bulging baggage of failures — should have been brought in.  Of course, any new CEO worthy of the title would have insisted that Balsillie and Lazaridis depart the board, as was the case at Yahoo recently.  It will take a few more tries, and several new shocks, before the company actually gets it right  — if it ever does.

Separation complexes are unfortunate in dogs.  They are a disaster in company founders who can no longer read the market or the wishes of their investors.  The new insider CEO is not the solution.  Nor is the appointment of Barbara Stymiest as the so-called “independent” board chair.  We were among the first — and long before it became fashionable — to openly call for this kind of change.  But putting a long-time enabler of RIM’s governance problems in charge of the board is a little like promoting a sleeping sentry to captain of the guards.

RIM’s boardroom is located in Waterloo, Ontario, but as far as investors are concerned, these changes only confirm that it remains firmly footed in denial.