When I attend annual meetings, I am often struck that no-one asks hard questions. The kind that make the CEO and directors squirm.PricewaterhouseCoopers has put out a list of questions to ask at...

Is it an early Christmas present for Conrad Black? Facing the possibility of at least 15 years in jail, Black has won a 10-day postponement of his scheduled Nov. 30 sentencing. His lawyer Jeffrey...

Interesting data coming out suggests that Sarbanes-Oxley is unlikely to be overhauled. That's despite the jury still out on its effectiveness.But a study released last week by Protiviti has found...

Every board, organization and employee comes across ethical dilemmas. After discussing these issues with ethicists, I have put together a framework to resolve them. There is no right or wrong answer...

If you are a manager, chief financial officer or auditor working for a company that comes out with a restatement, start looking for another job. That's the only conclusion you can draw from a new...

So Yahoo has reached a settlement with the families of Chinese journalists who were jailed after the company ratted on them. It comes after a savaging from Congressional representatives but this case...

Last week, I did a blog entry warning that wall street faces a "level three storm" with a change in an accounting rule that will force banks to rate their assets according to how liquid...

The good news is that sustainability is on the boardroom agenda. The bad news is that business doesn't know what to do about it.A new study by the Economist Intelligence Unit, Action or...

The climate change industry is in its early stages and it's worth monitoring. Business is now obsessed with carbon and carbon neutrality, which is difficult to define because we don't yet...

What's wrong with this picture? When bean counting giant Grant Thornton asked chief financial officers and senior comptrollers whether they thought auditors were responsible for detecting any and...

Facebook's plans for world domination have been revealed.In an interview in Portfolio.com, the company's chief financial officer Gideon Yu laid his cards on the table. ""There are...

The Government Accountability Office has once more canned the Internal Revenue Service for its sloppy internal controls, legacy systems and dodgy Information Security.In its report, the GAO said the...

Bad news for the British Government's attempt to cover up questions about BAE bribes to the Saudi Arabian government with two anti-arms trade groups, Campaign Against Arms Trade and The Corner...

With expectations that the world's biggest miner BHP Billiton will have to sweeten its bid for Rio Tinto, it's clear that Rio shareholders are in a very strong position. But the question is...

Not that long ago, I did a blog entry looking at a suggestion from Bearing Point's information technology global solutions leader Rob Hillard suggesting that companies should replace one-on-one...

Rupert Murdoch continues to rewrite the rules of corporate governance by appointing natalie Bancroft, a 27-year old opera singer, to the board of his global media empire. A mezzo-soprano who lives in...

It's often said that you can't teach ethics. But that's not the same as saying that ethical values can't be passed on. The problem with ethics awareness programs is that it's...

On the face of it, Conrad Black is facing a long spell behind bars after losing his 11th hour bid to stay out of jail failed when the judge refused to overturn his fraud conviction.Still, Black will...

As the Financial Times pointed out this week, an "information problem" lies at the bottom of the latest financial market turmoil. Let's put it simply: no-one knows how big the losses...

Good news and bad news for CEOs. The level of CEO turnover has eased back slightly but it's still insecure times for the top brass, according to the latest Booz Allen Hamilton study.CEO turnover...