Knowledge Centre

BHP to exit oil and gas in Woodside mega-deal as climate pressure heats up

Nick Toscano, The Sydney Morning Herald, 17 August 2021

BHP, the world’s top mining company, is accelerating its retreat from fossil fuels with a deal to sell its global oil and gas assets to Australian energy giant Woodside Petroleum. Following months of speculation, the companies announced an all-stock merger of BHP’s entire petroleum division spanning Australia, the Americas, and North Africa,...

socio political environment governance

No more excuses: how four leading companies diversified their Boards

Jason Wingard, Forbes, 12 August 2021

A recent Deloitte report reveals that not a single Fortune 500 board is representative of the US population in terms of gender and ethnicity, and, in 2020, minorities held just 18 per cent of Fortune 500 board seats. In the face of an increasingly strong business case for diverse boards, as well as mounting pressure from institutional...

governance corporate responsibility

‘I got fired’: Westpac ex-CEO wants to help you be ‘better’ after $1.3b blunder

Daniel Ziffer, ABC News, 05 May 2021

As chief executive of Westpac, Hartzer led more than 33,000 Westpac staff and helped create billions of dollars in profit. However, he was forced out in 2020 by investor pressure after Westpac broke anti-money laundering laws, allegedly 23 million times. Now, Mr Hartzer has written and released a book that explains how to boost staff engagement...

governance

UK to shake up how companies are run and audited

Reuters, 18 March 2021

The UK Government has set out proposals to tighten corporate governance and “inject more rigour and competition” into audits. The main proposals will look to add new obligations on auditors and directors around detecting and preventing fraud, as well as transparency and “resilience statements,” which set out how an organisation is mitigating...

socio political environment governance

We’re Entering the Age of Corporate Social Justice

Centre for Corporate Public Affairs, Lily Zheng, Harvard Business Review, June 15, 2020, 01 July 2020

Companies with effective Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programs are more profitable than those without a CSR scheme, according to academic research. Consumers and stakeholders now want companies to see social good as a necessity, moving it beyond a mere marketing strategy. To do this, Lily Zheng, from Harvard Business Review, recommends...

corporate responsibility csr governance

Working Through COVID-19 Together

Centre for Corporate Public Affairs, 23 April 2020

Rethinking Sustainability in the Middle of a Pandemic

socio political environment governance

Five Ways that ESG creates value

Witold Henisz, Tim Koller and Robin Nuttall, McKinsey & Company, 14 November 2019

Getting your environmental, social, and governance (ESG) proposition right links to higher value creation. As a result, ESG is an inextricable part of how you do business, and its individual elements are themselves intertwined. Hence, thinking and acting on ESG in a proactive way has lately become even more pressing. The US...

corporate reputation corporate responsibility governance

PODCAST

Best practice corporate affairs with Brett Zarb

30 September 2019

Brett Zarb, Head of Media and Communications at Suncorp, talks about how to achieve best practice planning, strategy and reporting in corporate affairs.

governance measurement adaptive leadership

Women going backwards at the top of corporate Australia

Peter Ryan, ABC News, Tuesday 10th September, 2019, 10 September 2019 The annual census by Chief Executive Women (CEW) which represents 560 female corporate leaders and analyses gender equality amongst Australia’s top 200 companies has said progress is slow with 17 companies still having no women in their leadership teams. CEW President Sue Morphett said she is disappointed by the findings. “There are some figures...

governance adaptive leadership