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If all goes well, a new body within existing accounting standards institutions will soon drive standardized approaches in sustainability reporting in Canada. There are some important challenges and critical questions that need to be addressed when forming the Canadian Sustainability Standards Board (CSSB) and defining its focus, composition, and mandate. The authors identify the following major questions that the committee should consider as it contemplates future oversight of sustainability standards: 1) How can Canadian standards setting be a model of reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples? The consultation process needs substantive Indigenous involvement or participation in the formation of the committee and in the development of the related consultation paper. 2) How will the CSSB manage tensions between international consistency versus local adaptation? In the establishment of the working rules of the new CSSB, it is important that maintaining international comparability is the north star for standards setting, and the development of the Canadian versions focuses primarily on additional elaboration that facilitates and enables adoption in the Canadian context. 3) How will the CSSB manage tensions between single-materiality (i.e., primary consideration of the impact of sustainability issues on the firm and its immediate stakeholders) and double-materiality (also providing comprehensive and comparable information on the wider impact of the firm on the environment and society)?

During the last decade, MedTech companies started to invest in building digital healthcare platforms to maintain their competitiveness in the Digital Economy. However, launching a new digital platform business revealed several challenges that MedTech incumbents must overcome, including value impedance. This is caused by digital transformation gaps, which, when left unmanaged, can stall digital healthcare platforms' growth and even lead to their demise. This article distills four dynamic capabilities: sensing the internal environment, value-capturing through connectedness, orchestrating silos, and transforming organizational boundaries. These mitigate value impedance and bestow competitive advantage to MedTech incumbents' digital platform business.

Shareholder primacy has been a widely accepted norm in the business community for decades, leading executives and directors to focus on maximizing profits along with the value of the corporation’s shares. Nevertheless, critics have long questioned whether public companies should prioritize the interests of investors over the interests of other stakeholders. The most recent analysis of the legal standard that dictates the fiduciary duty of directors in Canadian corporate law was issued in 2008 when the Supreme Court of Canada released the BCE v 1976 Debentureholders decision. Some scholars theorized that this decision signalled a shift toward a more stakeholder-friendly model of corporate governance by calling on directors to act in the “best interests of the corporation.” This article provides an overview of the framework governing the fiduciary duty of directors with an analysis of the historical and economic context that has underpinned this area of corporate law since the Great Depression. It then examines what director duties within Canada might look like in the future while offering insights from the landmark BCE decision to help manage the director’s dilemma. The BCE decision suggests that when competing interests arise, the overriding principle for corporate directors should be to act in the best interests of the corporation by making decisions that aim to drive long-term success, as opposed to immediate profits and increased share value.

Why unclear law and regulations make it challenging for Canadian boards to define their fiduciary duty, especially when stakeholder interests diverge

This article focuses on the use of IT systems to meet rapidly changing customer needs. It places particular emphasis on the building of IT “systems strength.” This is defined at Accenture as a measure of a company’s ability to innovate at scale. It is calculated by assessing three factors: tech adoption, tech depth, and organizational culture. The article builds on multiple large sample surveys, as well as in-depth interviewing with large organizations. The second part of the paper considers what to do if your company is not a market leader. Here, the authors explain how “middle-of-the-pack” organizations can leapfrog other firms to accelerate their innovation-led growth. The key here is to change the IT budget allocation from an emphasis on operations to an increased emphasis on innovation.

Digital platforms have disrupted many sectors but have not yet visibly transformed highly regulated industries. This study of Big Tech entry in healthcare and education explores how platforms have begun to enter highly regulated industries systematically and effectively. It presents a four-stage process model of platform entry, which we term as "digital colonization." This involves provision of data infrastructure services to regulated incumbents; data capture in the highly regulated industry; provision of data-driven insights; and design and commercialization of new products and services. The article clarifies platforms' sources of competitive advantage in highly regulated industries and concludes with managerial and policy recommendations.

Considerable resources are invested in producing sustainability reports, yet few organizations reap the transparency benefits they promise. This article explores the way ten leading global fashion companies use a combination of data visualization and placement, stakeholder-driven interactive content, and multi-media and immersive content to build the trust necessary to improve their reporting and transparency. While few organizations have the resources of the global fashion giants, this article proposes a four-stage framework that guides managers through a step-change of systematic and targeted improvement.

External auditors regularly interact with various parties at work, such as their accounting firms, engagement team members, and clients. These interactions can help shape the nature of auditors' social exchange relationships with these entities, which in turn may influence their behavior toward these targets. This installment of Accounting Matters draws from recently published research by Herda and colleagues to (1) explain how constructive auditor-target connections can develop and lead to beneficial outcomes like reduced auditor burnout and turnover intentions, as well as more citizenship behavior, and (2) discuss how these upshots might ultimately affect audit quality. This topic is important because audit quality translates into improved financial reporting, which helps stakeholders who rely on audited financial statements to make informed business decisions. Specifically, we underscore the key role auditors' perceptions of fair treatment from a relationship partner play in fostering a strong psychological bond with the target via perceived support. We further consider how auditors' consequent commitment to the target can result in favorable organizational outcomes, including enhanced audit and financial reporting quality. We also discuss practical implications for accounting firms.

Enterprise risk management (ERM) was introduced in the 1990s and has become an indicator of good management. Despite this success, many organizations still seek practical advice on ERM implementation. This article provides questions asked of an experienced chief risk officer and his staff by risk practitioners at many organizations over 11 years. Detailed answers based on best practices are provided. This article is important as it shows what areas were of concern related to ERM implementation, and many of these concerns may still apply today. The questions presented in this article fall in the following 10 areas of ERM implementation: background and context, organizational, getting started, risk identification, culture and engagement, risk criteria (which includes risk appetite and risk tolerances), tools and techniques, reporting, the benefits, and the future of ERM. This article should be of interest to practitioners involved with ERM, consultants in the area of ERM, and academics teaching courses on ERM, risk management, and related topics. This article will also provide a base against which further future research can be done to see how ERM evolves.

The COVID-19 pandemic that erupted in 2020 forced businesses across the world to adopt virtual meetings. With many people working from home, software platforms like Zoom and Teams became ubiquitous, but their widespread use also revealed many weaknesses and limitations. While technologies for virtual meetings have existed for decades, these technologies have advanced significantly in recent years, and today range from audioconference facilities to telepresence rooms with high-resolution video and sophisticated virtual presence features. The available alternatives differ significantly in costs, complexity and capabilities, and choosing the most effective technology for each meeting setting is not always easy. This is important, since after the pandemic, virtual meetings will move from being a necessity brought on by the pandemic to being a widely accepted alternative to traditional face-to-face meetings. Consequently, the questions of when and how to meet virtually will become even more significant. In this article, we describe a decision-making framework for choosing when and how to meet virtually, based on matching the appropriate communication capabilities with various meeting objectives and taking into account meeting size and duration. The framework is based on extensive empirical research conducted in partnership with several major U.S. and European companies.

Multisided marketplaces have become fixtures in many contemporary industries. From Amazon to Google, platforms dominate entire markets and have become some of the world's most valuable companies. Despite their success, these companies have a subtle but potentially fatal weakness: disintermediation. This occurs when buyers and sellers find each other on the platform and then bypass that very platform--and its commission--to complete their transaction directly, off of the platform. This article compiles and illustrates the causes of and remediations to platform disintermediation.

Because of their remarkable history of financial success, corporate spinoffs are the subject of perennial interest and investigation. We critically review quantitative and case-based research to determine the conditions under which a spin-off divestiture provides beneficial results for the conglomerate, the newly independent subsidiary, and the stockholders. The shared goal of spin-off researchers is to understand the rationale for the financial success that spin-off firms and their newly disconnected conglomerates experience. Our review and synthesis of the findings include 30 years of academic research by scholars in strategic and business management, commercial research by independent researchers and consulting firms, and IRS and US Treasury documents that detail when a spin-off qualifies for a corporate tax-free exchange. Our central finding is that spin-offs, conglomerates, and stockholders benefit from tax-free divestiture and subsequent refocusing by the companies. The article explains the breadth of spin-off divestitures and the benefits of their success in the US. These results center on helping decision-makers recognize the situational factors that support the choice of a spin-off strategy.

The COVID-19 crisis has fundamentally changed how many businesses operate and connect with their customers. Previously unheard-of government restrictions and sheltering-in-place requirements forced most professional services to transition to remote delivery methods (e.g., email, telephone, video consults, Shopify storefronts). Providers of low-touch services (e.g., lawyers, accountants) naturally lent themselves to remote delivery; however, those that offer high-touch services, particularly those in healthcare (e.g., doctors, chiropractors, physical therapists), experienced a drastic change in working conditions when going virtual. Despite a long history of resistance to virtual delivery, the pandemic created an unprecedented incentive for these high-touch professionals to experiment with underutilized care models such as telehealth: the provision of healthcare services remotely using telecommunications technologies. We examine the rapid adoption of telehealth during COVID-19 through the coming together or convergence of previously unrelated technologies, spaces, and practices. Our analysis reveals opportunities and challenges associated with going hands-off that apply to many other professionals providing high-trust services. Specifically, we offer nine guiding principles for building and protecting cognitive and affective trust in virtual and hybrid delivery models. This is important given the pace of compounding technology convergences that lie ahead for service professionals.

In the contemporary business reality, marked by unemployment and loose labor markets, workplace abuse is likely to climb as organizations and managers wield increased leverage in the employment relationship. We explore the organizational phenomenon of worker abuse and examine workplace blog accounts from abused workers to uncover shared insights. Based on these findings, we offer research-based suggestions, implications for practice, and resources for organizations, managers, and workers. Specifically, we advance an ABUSE mitigation model as a holistic management system for identifying and dealing with workplace abuse.

Digitalization is transforming the industrial landscape. Smarter products, data-based services, and new business models promise to reshape the whole manufacturing industry. But just below the visible excitement lurk unexpected tensions and challenges that can make digital transformation an excruciating journey for industrial companies. In this article, we decipher the digital transformation strategy choices of leading industrial firms in a highly innovative country. We then identify four dominant tensions that managers need to sort out. We also provide guiding principles for selecting a digital transformation strategy capable of overcoming each of the identified tensions.

Although foreignness can bring both benefits and costs to a business, much of the literature has focused on the liability of foreignness (LOF), while relatively little attention has been paid to the positive side. Despite the presence of LOFs, foreign companies may accrue some unique advantages from their foreign status, which are referred to as assets of foreignness (AOFs). Drawing upon social-capital theory and institutional theory, this article examines the issue of LOFs versus AOFs in the context of the informal networks in Korea and explores how foreign companies can manage their weaknesses in host-country-specific informal networks to create value from their foreignness. We discuss two practical strategies, reactive and proactive strategies, that can be used by foreign companies. While these two strategies can be pursued in parallel, this article suggests that foreign companies should prioritize pursuing proactive strategies. This article contributes to a more nuanced understanding of the role of foreignness in the international business context and provides practical insights into how foreign companies can leverage their foreign status in developing their own informal networks in Korea.

The top online marketplaces in the world, including Alibaba, Amazon, and eBay, sold $2.7 trillion in 2020, or 62% of global web sales that year. Despite the promise of unfettered access to customers, the reality is that most sellers struggle with unprecedented and unauthorized rogue resellers. These often anonymous, third-party individuals and firms may not provide the quality experiences aligned with customers' expectations of a brand and often market their goods in competition with trusted partners. This requires a systematic battle plan to effectively protect the seller's brand equity, service promise, and authorized distribution network. We describe the channel war that is at work and the forces fueling its development. We explain how rogue reseller activities drive down pricing, increase channel competition and conflict, impact the customer experience, and harm brand equity. We recommend revising product policies, procedures, and agreements to begin to differentiate products from those sold by unauthorized parties. We also recommend a legal strategy to complement these efforts. Critical steps include regular and active enforcement as well as implementing services, benefits, and quality controls for the brand's products that cannot be replicated by unauthorized sellers and requiring authorized distributors and retailers to maintain those benefits and controls.

Statistical significance functions as an arbiter of sorts for data analysis purporting to show a relationship between two or more variables. Unfortunately, in far too many situations, statistical significance may lead decision-makers relying on data and analytics to improve business decisions astray, particularly in the context of big data. In this article, I outline reasons why executives should develop a healthy discernment when they see the phrase "statistically significant" in media outlets, internal analyses, consulting reports, and other sources. To overcome the limitations of focusing on statistical significance, I propose executives shift their attention toward the effect size reported from a statistical model. While not without limitation, effect sizes are more useful to decision-makers, highlight the practical implication of analyses, and help in quantifying the uncertainty inherent to working with data.

With crowds once again packing sporting events, theatres, and restaurants, business leaders must effectively communicate to employees what their work lives will look like in the days and months ahead if social distancing doesn’t return. After two years of operating remotely, rushing decisions about the future of work to keep up with the rapid loosening of restrictions is indeed the wrong way to go. With some forethought and planning, along with early and frequent communication, companies can get the return of employees to work right, avoid costly lawsuits, and usher in a new era in employee relations. But first there are a lot of questions to answer: 1) How will you mitigate COVID-related risk? 2) How much flexibility will you offer? 3) How will you approach business travel? 4) How will you support employee mental health? 5) How will you support workforce equality? 6) How will you support your new policies? The days of rigid schedules or constant face time have passed. To keep your best people, you need to give them some ability to custom design their work lives. So, rather than dictating where they work and when they do it, seize the opportunity to build more trust by measuring your employees on their output and value. This will help keep them happy, healthy, refreshed, and productive.

Twelve years ago, in 2010, the private equity firm New Mountain Capital acquired a little-known Wisconsin software company, RedPrairie, for $565 million. In September 2021 it sold that same company, now named Blue Yonder, for $8.5 billion to Panasonic. About $5.7 billion of the gain had come from organic growth, not acquisitions. That success wasn't driven by any specific lucky break, technology breakthrough, or new product. Rather, it was the result of continual investment and improvement in the company's management, strategy, and governance--the same approach that best-in-class private equity firms have employed for years across dozens of industries and thousands of companies. By explaining how New Mountain transformed Blue Yonder, this article shows how private equity firms create value for businesses and for the economy. And it underscores how much the PE industry has evolved since its inception.