Finlay ON Governance
The straight goods on ethics, governance and leadership. Insights and commentary on today's news and tomorrows headlines you won't see, hear or read anywhere else. Immediate Media InquiryThe Black Touch
The same Napoleonic scale of misjudgments and miscalculations that have dogged his business decisions are now inexorably shaping Conrad Black’s legal destiny. It is one thing not to show remorse for the crimes of which one has been convicted; it is quite another to...
Lord Black’s Bankerly Circle of Beneficence
Anyone might give a helping hand to struggling musicians, hungry journalists or stranded students. But bankers? If there is more compelling evidence of a selfless heart on the part of Conrad Black, it's hard to imagine what it would be. Conrad Black’s defence team has...
Outrage of the Week: Conrad Black’s Return to the National Post
The trial of Conrad Black and its wider significance in the annals of business leadership and corporate ethics has occupied some considerable space at Finlay ON Governance. We advanced no position on Mr. Black’s guilt or innocence while the matter was before a jury....
Bre-X: The Giant Fraud that Started with a Bang Ends with a Regulator’s Whimper
From the stock market watchdogs who permitted the premature listing of the company to the cops and regulators who were unsuccessful in bringing even a single fraudster to justice, Bre-X was a colossal failure at every level. It’s not surprising that the Ontario...
The Fall of Conrad Black | Part 1 | The Unheeded Lessons from Lord Kylsant of Carmarthen
Seventy–six years ago, the business world was rocked by another sensational trial involving corporate fraud and the scamming of investors with a prominent baron at the centre of the scandal. It did not end well for Lord Kylsant of Carmarthen. The uncanny similarities...
The Trial of Conrad Black | Early Verdicts Part 2: Legacy Squandered
If Conrad Black is a great businessman, what and where is his legacy? Is it a thriving corporate empire, or is it just a Napoleonic ego exiled to some kind of legal Elba? As Conrad Black awaits his fate at the hands of a federal court jury in Chicago, one can only...
The Trial of Conrad Black | Early Verdicts Part 1: Governance and Gatekeepers
Whatever else it may be, the Hollinger saga has been another valuable lesson in how not to run a company —and in what kind of company investors should avoid. Even before the outcome is known in the trial of Conrad Black and other former officers and directors of...
Outrage of the Week: The Vanishing Stakeholder
In too many ways, the primacy of the ordinary individual —as citizen, employee and investor— which has long been the backbone of modern social progress, is being left to disappear amid an onslaught of privileged special interests, civil rights-invading bureaucrats,...
Melnyk’s Resignation from Biovail: When the SEC Comes Knocking at Your Door it Tends to Concentrate the Mind
I had an interview with Peter Brieger yesterday about the sudden resignation of Biovail head Eugene Melnyk. It's in today's Financial Post. Mr. Melnyk’s is a familiar story where a dynamic entrepreneur founds a company, does well, tends to dominate its affairs and...
Did You Hear the One About the Audit Committee?
There was an economist, an ex-diplomat and a former governor. The economist didn’t read what she received, the diplomat "missed” what was written and the governor just "skimmed”. And this was the audit committee —the so-called more “active” directors. On the same...