Building Respected Companies
Rethinking Business Leadership and the Purpose of the Firm

Develops a new perspective on the firm and business leadership whereby companies serve society, not just their shareholders.

Jordi Canals (Author)

9780521192101, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 17 June 2010

282 pages, 7 b/w illus. 15 tables
23.4 x 16 x 1.8 cm, 0.6 kg

'This thoughtful book is no opportunistic response to recent events. Jordi Canals has been asking profound questions for many years: What exactly are companies for? How should CEOs be judged? Can short-term and long-term objectives be reconciled? Here he suggests sage and workable answers to these and other highly topical issues.' Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO, WPP

The current financial crisis has deep macroeconomic roots, but the dominant view of the firm has made the crisis deeper and more devastating. Over the past few decades, maximizing shareholder value has become the main objective of the firm. Chief executives have been keen on this objective because their economic incentives have been clearly associated with stock market performance. Unfortunately, this has driven many CEOs to make terrible decisions based on short-termism and greed. In this way, the firm has become the object of anger, criticism and cynicism. In Building Respected Companies, Jordi Canals argues that we must address this problem by developing companies that serve society, not just their shareholders. This requires a new perspective of what a firm is, what the purpose of the firm in society should be and what the role of the board of directors and senior executives should be.

List of figures
List of tables
Preface
Acknowledgements
Part I. Corporate Crisis, Leadership and Governance: 1. Financial crisis. Leadership crisis?
Part II. Rethinking the Purpose of the Firm: 2. The firm's mission and purpose
3. The firm as a respected institution
Part III. The Role of Corporate Governance in Developing a Respected Company: 4. Nature, goals and models of corporate governance
5. Responsible firms
Part IV. Leading and Growing a Respected Company: 6. The board of directors at work: impact beyond regulation
7. The chief executive: reputation beyond charisma
8. The role of the chief executive in developing the company as a respected institution
Index.

Subject Areas: Corporate governance [KJR], Management: leadership & motivation [KJMB], Business ethics & social responsibility [KJG], Business & management [KJ]