Professional Project Corporate Governance and Social Responsibility

Question: The project plan aims to ensure you have an appropriate, achievable business project and sets down the key milestones that must be achieved within the term. You will be working with another member of this course. Your plan should include: Proposal Working Title - Provide a short descriptive title . Project Description - provide aims and background to the research (brief introduction to the literature in the area) The significance (locally, nationally and/or potentially internationally or in terms of theory development or application to a problem) Answer: Proposal Working Title: Impact of Good Corporate Governance on the Brand Image of Retail Company in Australia: A Case Study on Woolworths Limited Project Description Project aim: The aim of this project is to investigate and develop an idea on the effects of good corporate governance on the brand image of an Australian retail organization. Background of the study: Christensen et al. (2015) stated that corporate governance is the key area that controls the performance of a company. In the present global business world, the business organizations deal with more critical situations than before. The companies whether profit-making or non-profit making, need to take special care of three primary grounds of corporate governance and that are Environmental, Social and Ethical (Tricker, 2015). In Australia, companies are becoming more conscious about improving their performances on these three grounds. Good corporate governance practice improves the relationship between the firm and its stakeholders. In case of Woolworths Limited, the management has taken effective corporate governance strategies in order to improve the sustainability of the organization. ArAs (2016) stated that, the corporate governance strategy of Woolworths Limited is focused on the improvement of the efficiency level by reducing the waste level and enhancing the level of customers expectations. As per the 2015s annual report of the company, it has reduced 42% of the carbon emission between 2007 to 2015. In the same time span, the company has saved 200 million liters water and taken policies regarding ethical sourcing of resources like, seafood, paper, palm oil, animal welfare and timber (Woolworths CSR Report 2015. 2016). However, Dignam Galanis (2016) argued that though the management of Woolworths has taken several corporate social policies for maintaining their ethical, social and environmental grounds, still the company faced controversies against its quality of products. Due to this controversy, the financial performance of the company declined. The company sold 2liters milk at $0.50, which caused huge loss to the company. This indicates that corporate governance policies of Woolworths Limited failed to improve the performance of the company (News.com.au. 2016). On the other side, Ortas et al. (2015) mentioned that proper use of corporate governance policy can bring tremendous success to the organization. For example, Coca-Cola has gained the trusts of the people again just by improving their corporate governance policies and following the policies strictly. Therefore, in the above discussion, it is not clear that whether the corporate governance have positive impact of brand image of the company or not. Hence, the impact of corporate governance is a matter of investigation in this study. The Significance Good corporate governance policies are essential for long life of the business organization. The impact of corporate governance policies of a company can be identified on the business performance of the company in local, national and international market (Cuomo et al. 2015). This is also applicable for Woolworths Limited also. As stated above, in 2015, Woolworths has taken several strategies for good corporate governance. The impact of these policies can be stated below: The company has been successful in reducing the carbon emission by more than 40%, for which the brand image of the company has improved in the national and international market. The strategy of using biodiesel has helped the company in contributing towards the improvement of local environment. The sustainable product packaging and recycling strategies have created a positive brand image in the minds of the local customers. The policy of developing corporate water tree in the year of 2010 has created a transparent brand image of the company in international as well as local market (Woolworths CSR Report 2015. 2016). The above-mentioned policies of Woolworths Limited have been taken on social, ethical and environmental grounds. Apart from these policies, the company has taken several policies for stakeholder management. Corporate Act, 2001, governs the policies taken by the company for stakeholder management. The shareholders engagement policy taken by the company helped to improve the trust of the shareholders on the company. At the same time, the full disclosure policy has reflected the transparency of business operation. The customer insight department of the company has improved the relationship between company and its customers (Woolworths CSR Report 2015. 2016). However, the corporate governance policies of Woolworths Limited are influenced by the theories of corporate governance. There is mainly one theory that has influenced the corporate governance policies at Woolworths Limited and this theory is Agency theory. As per the agency theory, corporate governance of a company must be able to solve the principal-agent problem in the organization. If the corporate governance policies especially the stakeholder management policies of Woolworths are analyzed, then it can be identified that the company has taken fair decision for each of its stakeholders. The full disclosure policy has solved the agent-principal problem to a higher extent. Research questions The research questions are as under: How much the corporate governance of an organization is responsible for creating positive internal and external business environment? How much the corporate governance policies at Woolworths Limited are sound on ethical, social and environmental ground? What are the positive and negative impacts of corporate governance policies on the performance of Woolworths Limited? What are the possible ways that can help Woolworths Limited in improving the corporate governance policies? Gantt chart and Assessment Milestone Gantt chart: Activities Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Identifying the project topic Setting the aim of the project Background research Setting the research question Collecting relevant data and analysis of the data Identifying the results Final project report preparation Submission of the project Assessment Milestone: Achievements Years Implement of Hybrid Power Trucks 2009 Declined water use 2010 Developed Corporate Water Tree 2010 Achieved 25% reduction in the carbon emission 2012 Achieved 42% reduction in the carbon emission 2015 Team Charter Team purpose To identify the importance of corporate governance Duration and time commitment 7 weeks Scope Identification of positive and negative impact of corporate governance on the business performance of a company Desired end result There is positive impact of good corporate governance on the performance of a company Supporting resources Annual report of Woolworths Limited, articles on Australian corporate governance principles and journals on corporate governance theories Deliverables Timely submission, information from reliable sources Reference List: ArAs, G. (2016).A handbook of corporate governance and social responsibility. CRC Press. Christensen, J., Kent, P., Routledge, J., Stewart, J. (2015). Do corporate governance recommendations improve the performance and accountability of small listed companies?.Accounting Finance,55(1), 133-164. Cuomo, F., Mallin, C., Zattoni, A. (2015). Corporate Governance Codes: A Review and Research Agenda.Corporate Governance: An International Review. Dignam, A., Galanis, M. (2016).The globalization of corporate governance. Routledge. News.com.au. (2016). News.com.au. Retrieved 17 July 2016, from https://www.news.com.au/ Ortas, E., lvarez, I., Jaussaud, J., Garayar, A. (2015). The impact of institutional and social context on corporate environmental, social and governance performance of companies committed to voluntary corporate social responsibility initiatives.Journal of Cleaner Production,108, 673-684. Tricker, B. (2015).Corporate governance: Principles, policies, and practices. Oxford University Press, USA. Woolworths CSR Report 2015. (2016). Woolworthslimited2015.csr-report.com.au. Retrieved 17 July 2016, from https://woolworthslimited2015.csr-report.com.au/