The institution of strong corporate governance structures has been highlighted as one of the many critical things that need to be in place to ensure the success and longevity of Ghana’s banking industry and other industries and businesses.
According to these stakeholders, the recent default of banks, subsequent financial sector reforms, and collapse of many organizations and businesses all allude to weak or poor corporate governance being used by the involved outfits.
These assertions were made during a Leadership Conversation Series organized by Calbank PLC in collaboration with the UK-Ghana Chamber of Commerce in Accra on Tuesday.
Reggie Mark-Hansen, a Human Resource Business Professional, advised organizations to do due diligence and proper background checks during the onboarding process of their board of directors to check conflict of interest.
In addition to that, the Chief Risk Officer at Calbank PLC, Barbara Banson, stressed the need for organizations to assess the performance of their boards to fish out members that are underperforming.
“It’s not just about the onboarding. Once the person is on the board, have we put in place things to make sure that we assess their performance on the board? It’s not just like they come to the boardroom and do nothing, although they have the expertise and qualifications. How do they impact the discussions that happen in the boardroom? Most of the time, it’s all about conflict of interest. The charter of the board should be able to first find ways of bringing those who are underperforming to speed or taking them out and replacing, and these are all stated in the Company’s Act.”
On her part, the Executive Director of UK-Ghana Chamber of Commerce, Adjoba Kyiamah, tasked regulators to constantly follow up on the boards of organizations to ensure the right things are being done.
“Compliance is not just self-compliance, but also has to do with compliance being ensured by the regulators. The regulators have an obligation to do follow-ups to make sure that businesses are compliant with the laws of the nation and have systems in place to ensure that businesses are being run and the employees in that business are being taken care of, the right taxes are being paid, and the right laws are being complied with.”
The significance of Corporate Governance in today’s progressive and dynamic business environment cannot be denied.
Now, more than ever, there is an increasing emphasis on improving corporate processes, transparency, accountabilities, and controls for the purposes of reducing abuses of power, all necessary for promoting long-term investment, financial stability, and business integrity, within organizations and businesses.
The Calbank and UK-Ghana Chamber of Commerce Leadership Conversation Series which was focused on good corporate governance brought together stakeholders in the finance sector to provide an understanding of current practices of good corporate governance and how it can be used to mitigate risk in organizations and businesses, to ensure sustainability, accountability, efficiency, and profitability.
Other resource persons on the panel of the Leadership Conversation Series were the Founder of the Corporate law Institute, Felix Ntrakwah and Head of Sirdar Ghana Ltd, Catherine Engmann.
