Maria Federica Izzo

Corporate Social Responsibility and Firms Performance - An Analysis on Italian Listed Companies

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is getting an increasingly important issue for economic agents all over the world, due to a new attention to all the aspects of firms activities and their relationships with stakeholders. Also in Italy, the number of firms that prepare voluntary corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports (e.g. sustainability reports, environmental reports, environmental and social reports or corporate social responsibility reports) is increasing. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of the voluntary disclosure about Corporate Social Responsibility on firms stock prices of Italian listed companies in order to analyze if it can somehow contribute to increase the stock market prices. Our empirical analysis will test the relation, during a period of three years, between corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports and firms stock prices, considering a sample of Italian listed companies.

Bringing theory to practice: how to extract value from corporate social responsibility

Purpose – This contribution aims to clarify the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) as an issue of governance and a strategic tool more than a mere communication activity, with a potential impact on both organizations and their economic and financial performance. Design/methodology/approach – The paper provides an overview of the literature contribution on CSR and its impact on value, offering a new conceptual model useful both for managers and relevant stakeholders in assessing, through an integrated approach, the company performance. Findings – The analysis focuses on how CSR investments can create value for companies and for stakeholders in general. This can occur if the related benefits exceed the related costs, generating a favorable balance toward what we called the virtuous cycle of CSR. This cycle is made up of four steps – decision, design, action and result – that define a potential value creation path that a responsible firm can take, assuming that it integrates a social agenda into i...

Corporate social performance and cost of debt: the relationship

Purpose - This paper aims to investigate the link between corporate social performance (CSP) and cost of debt financing. Despite academic debate has focused on the link between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and CSP (expressed through accounting and market measures of profitability), few empirical researches have analysed the relations between CSR, cost of debt and its relation with the risk profile of a firm. The literature on the cost of debt determinants generally documents a negative association between measures of the risk of the firm and its cost of debt. The literature on CSR defines risk reduction as one of the potential benefits related to CSR activities. Thus, the expectation is that high CSP scores are inversely related to cost of debt. Design/methodology/approach - Using a unique data set of 332 firms over a time period of five years antecedent to the global financial crisis, a linear regression model is applied. Findings - The results show a positive relation between CSP and cost of debt, demonstrating that CSR is not a value driver with an impact on the firm’s risk profile. Practical implications - The research has also practical implications as it makes managers aware of the potentiality of CSP to reduce the firm’s cost of debt. Originality/value - These findings enlarge the empirical research on the value of CSP, expanding it towards a quite new area of investigation: the cost of external financing.

Learning by Doing Mistakes Improving ICT Systems Through the Evaluation of Application Mistakes

Last July, the University of Exeter, Great Britain, has empirically demonstrated how the human brain learns more from mistakes and unsuccessful events than from successful experiences. Memory, in fact, is more stimulated by mistakes and, after that, tends to generate a self-protection mechanism that, in a reaction period of 0, 10 s, warns of the existing danger. Starting from the article of Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, we have tried to understand if the economic organizations, and in particular the ones that face IT implementation programs, act as humans. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how it is possible to invert a negative tendency or an unsuccessful IS implementation through the deeply analysis of mistakes and of their impact on value creation. In our proposal, the analyzed case study shows how a correct management of mistakes can generate value, through a “virtuous cycle of learning by doing”.

The Influence of Corporate Governance on the Adoption of The Integrated Report: A first Study on IIRC Pilot Programme

This chapter has three main aims. First, it discusses the concept of Integrated Report (IR) as a privileged instrument of companies’ voluntary disclosure practices that answers to the investors and regulators’ call for a greater focus on companies’ strategy, governance, future performance and risks, overcoming a great part of the traditional financial statement’s limitations. Second, it introduces key issues currently being debated relating to the IR Pilot Program and the main characteristics of the companies that decided to adhere to it. Finally, it shows some empirical first results about the corporate governance factors associated with the voluntary decision to prepare an Integrated Report according to the IR International Framework. In so doing the authors draw some conclusions about how Corporate Governance structure and mechanisms—such as legal environment, composition of the board of directors or ownership structure—are related to company’s disclosure policies and the decision to adopt Integrated Report.

Exploring the Effects of Corporate Governance on Voluntary Disclosure: An Explanatory Study on the Adoption of Integrated Report

Abstract Purpose The chapter builds on the literature of Agency and Signalling Theories to analyse the corporate governance factors associated with the voluntary decision to prepare an Integrated Report according to the International Framework promoted by the IIRC. Methodology/approach The chapter is based on the results of a probit regression run with regard to a sample of 35 companies that joined the Pilot Programme in 2011 and 137 similar companies that did not. Findings The analysis of two samples of European companies reveals that adhesion to the IR Pilot Programme is positively related to the gender diversity and size of the board. Research limitations Further research is required in order to study the differences between listed and non-listed companies in terms of variables affecting the adoption of the Framework and to increase the time range of our study. In addition, it would be interesting to include other variables capturing different aspects other than corporate governance, since the decision to join the Programme, as the results of our analysis have shown, may also be influenced by other factors, such as strategy decisions and communication policies. Originality/value The chapter adds to the existing literature by showing the main governance characteristics that impact the decision to adhere to the IR Pilot Programme. It is also important to the existing literature regarding the role played by gender diversity in corporate governance mechanisms and CSR policies.