Ira M. Millstein is a highly respected figure of corporate America. This great business lawyer has held a building role in the development of corporate governance at is best, deserving the admiration from both the Sell and the BUy Side , the big issuers such as GM , GE, Pfizer or DuPont and also the most important asset managers and pension funds. Geoff Colvin of Fortune Magazine ask him at Columbia Law School about his last book, The Activist Director: Lessons from the Boardroom and the Future of the Corporation.
Ira recognizes that following the financial crisis settlement and the two regulation waves of Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank big banks felt reassured and dropped their earlier concern for a better governance. Also the usual heard instrincts partnered with the pressure for compliance to produce fairly boring Boards. Ira insists on the urgent need for corporation to get new highly engaged directors at their Board, knowing their business and willing to know the company in depth, very informed, more open to the rest of the world and to the demands of the general public.
Activist shareholders, says Ira, are also very useful. They are not always right but they should be always listen to.
Ira is sharing with us a serious worry about the impredictible Mr. Trump and the need of the CEOs for serious assistance from their Directors. Ira is calling for a new breed of “activist” directors who partner with management and reject short-term outlooks, plan a future based on growth and innovation, and take responsibility for corporate organization, strategy and efficiency.
Paris, 11 May 2017
