Do Board Committees Make a Difference?

Abstract

Purpose – This paper develops a discussion leading on from a paper relating the influence of board committees combined with board structure/composition and remuneration and corporate governance on the financial performance of a public listed corporation.

Design/methodology/approach – This study entails two legal systems, common law including; Australia, The United States of America and The United Kingdom; and codified law including; Germany, France and Italy.

The data collected is from public listed corporations from 2000–2006 for the development of multivariate regression models for parametric data.

These developed models are constructed to test relationships between dependent and independent variables in line with research questions and hypotheses.

Findings – The findings found that there was a mixture of results of results between unitary board structures in common law legal systems and dual boards in codified law legal systems.

Originality/value – The paper will be of vital importance to other academics looking at this question, and to both public and private sector entities.

Keywords: board remuneration, board composition, corporate governance, board structure, board committees

JEL Classification: D21, D22, D31, D79, G35, L25, M41