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Corporate Governance Review 2020: connecting the dots

Our 19th annual Corporate Governance Review reveals only a minority of firms are joining up the dots of governance to create sustainable value. If you're one of the ones not doing this, Simon Lowe explains why you should be.

For almost 20 years, our Corporate Governance Review has examined how the reporting of applied governance practices has evolved among FTSE 350 companies. With the new UK Corporate Governance Code starting to bed in and COVID-19 acting as a catalyst, this year’s review captures a snapshot of a changing world.

Corporate Governance Review 2020

This year's Corporate Governance Review shows that the best-performing companies are embracing governance activities, not as separate compliance needs, but as business essentials that are fundamentally linked; risks to strategy, strategy to purpose, and reward to what really matters to all.

These companies succeed by using governance as a dynamic framework to sharpen operational agility, build present and future resilience and, ultimately, to create and sustain value. Yet, still, it seems many see the Code as a box to be ticked. This is a mistake.

The Code is a guide; a distillation of governance best practice and reporting that can be used as a blueprint to build and develop your own governance strategy. It encourages an approach that recognises and embraces the interconnectivity of its parts:

  • Purpose
  • Culture
  • Board effectiveness
  • Diversity and inclusion
  • Risk mitigation
  • And more

This helps set the principles on which a business is run. Good reporting then demonstrates the underlying application of those principles, creating transparency and building trust.

We know it works

Our own extensive research proves a correlation between good governance practice and long-term sustained value creation. As we continue to map a new way of working, understanding how the most-effective companies are using good governance, and how you measure up, could help you plan for the future.

 

Published from Grant Thornton UK