Brief Report
The six-day Faculty Development Programme in Corporate Governance and Responsibility is designed to provide rigorous training and inputs to assist participants enhance and enrich their knowledge and teaching skills in the field of Governance and responsibility.
The key objectives of the programme were:
a) To sensitize the participants to the embedded ethical element in Governance and responsibility.
b) To share the contemporary cases and frameworks pertaining to Governance and responsibility
c) To engage the participants to reflect on the pedagogy and development of teaching material to appropriately impact in the MBA classroom.
Design of the programme:
Given the above objectives and philosophy of the program, it was decided that there would be near equal focus on ethics, governance, CSR and teaching methodology. An overview of the coverage of the four sessions is given below:
a. Understanding the ethical foundations of business:
In recent years, many faculty members who teach Corporate Governance and CSR tend to treat the course as a tool/application course. The first session sets the modern Corporation in the context of its role and responsibility to Society within an ethics framework. Why should companies engage with CSR and Governance? The role of organizations as citizens and the expectations of good behaviour and transparency from them will are highlighted. It is also intended to highlight the role of Corporations as “Citizens”. Subsequent sessions focus on the manner in which individual ethics translates as managerial ethics and through managerial actions reflects the behavior of the organization. The role of international standards in the field of Governance and CSR and their influence on changing ethical behaviours of corporations is also highlighted.
b. Corporate Governance:
The origins of the corporate form of organization, related theoretical frameworks, and evolution of corporate legislation internationally, and with specific reference to India are covered. The roles and responsibilities of the various actors namely shareholders, board, directors and institutional investors are discussed. Contemporary topics pertaining to Board stewardship, executive compensation, Governance issues in Mergers and Acquisitions are discussed.
c. Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility:
The responsibility of corporations extends beyond shareholders, to other stakeholders. Triple Bottom Line and People-Profit-Planet approaches to corporate responsibility require a deeper understanding. Various developments in the field of CSR, both international and Indian require a deeper understanding. The challenge is to frame CSR as more than just philanthropy; embedding responsibility in the operations and decision-making processes of the organization. Significant emphasis is also laid on environmental responsibility and its role in the context of the sustainability discussions.
d. Innovations in teaching governance, ethics and CSR:
Faculty members tend to use various pedagogical innovations to teach. While the case study is the most popular, others include simulation, experiential exercises, movies, literature, visits, parables, learning logs and situation vignettes are being used by faculty. This session is to sensitize them to these methods and also discuss on what methods do they use to influence students in the class room.
Some key features of the programme:
A set of 5-6 faculty members teach the entire course. This is done to demonstrate a range of faculty styles, methods and pedagogies that can be used.
A panel discussion is held where practitioners are brought in to share their experiences in Governance and CSR. This helps the participants to marry theory and practice together.