Maurizio Rija

Innovative IC Framework in the Non-Profit Sector

The importance of intellectual capital in the non-profit sector generates the need to measure its role in the value creation process. The purpose of the paper is to study the application of intellectual capital within the non-profit sector, by turning attention to resources such as: knowledge, experience, and skills. Organizations, which are able to increase the knowledge of their staff and transform this knowledge into skills to improve services, can easily meet users’ needs and, thereby, become competitive. This contribution proposes to study how people’s knowledge can contribute to increasing social value, which is the non–profit organization’s aim. Furthermore, the goal is to demonstrate how collaboration between staff and volunteers is essential to professional services. Finally, the research proposes a conceptual framework in which intellectual capital helps in defining the strategic issues, which non–profit organizations must tackle in order to achieve their social programs.

Auditing Quality: Some Empirical Studies

Much has been written on audit quality, but there are still many differences in the literature. After two decades of research on audit quality, there is no universally accepted definition by researchers, who are still far from the establishment of a single framework of indicators which determine, unequivocally, whether the activity of statutory auditor has taken place according to the guidelines set forth in the applicable standards. Various definitions have been developed that are based on different approaches. Importantly, it is a topic in continuous evolution and the debate in the literature is now very open. It seems clear that the concept of audit quality has become, over the years, more and more important as a growing need was felt to ensure the truth and accuracy of the data contained in financial statements, ensuring the quality of financial information by transmitting confidence in this way to the markets and stakeholders who, in making decisions, legitimately rely on accounting records. In this paper, the definitions of quality that the literature has developed over the years will be presented and issues will be addressed related to the measurement of quality through proxies that researchers have used. Finally, the possible future studies to make further contributions to research will be briefly analyzed.

Disclosure by Public Utility Companies on Internet Sites

In recent years the role of public utility companies has acquired increasing relevance on account of the growing awareness of the importance of such services in the social and economic development of Italy, and on the demands of for quality and value for money by an ever more discerning public (which has brought under scrutiny the methods of traditional service providers, no longer seen as able to respond efficiently to the changing and diversified needs of society), the need to conform to EU directives and the effects of liberalization and from an internal perspective the industrial and institutional reorganization of the sector. After a description of the theoretical background, the work goes on to analyze disclosure on internet sites of the public utilities listed on the Italian Stock Exchange. Given the fundamental role played by these companies, the paper investigates the levels of total and partial disclosure and identifies the successful elements as well as those areas where improvements could be made.

The Placement of the Internal Auditing Organization: Analysis of Companies Listed in the Star Segment of the Italian Stock Exchange

After a review of the existing literature, the research aims to analyze the information emerging from corporate governance reports in 2015, in reference to the year 2014, which the companies prepare as part of information provided annually to the market. The sample for analysis is the group of companies belonging to the Ftse Italy Star Italian Stock Exchange. The research has shown, as the first element in the survey, that nearly all of the companies have created a dedicated function or outsourced the internal audit activity. The second major finding from the analysis is that in most companies the function depends hierarchically on the board. The third point analyzed concerns the figure of responsible for Internal Auditing, as established by the Code of Conduct; it replaces the person responsible for internal control and risk management. The analysis showed that almost all the companies have attributed the tasks and responsibilities of the person responsible for internal control to the Head of the Internal Audit Department, due to the coincidence of the operating environments of the two figures and the strong synergies between the two roles. The last point analyzed covers the case where the internal auditing department is decentralized or, on the contrary, remains within the company. The results showed a substantial range of companies chose not to outsource the function.

An innovative model for a sustainability report in no-profit organisations

After a review of the literature, the research aims to build a sustainability report for NPOs through a set of economic, environmental and social indicators based on best international practice. Then the report will be applied to a voluntary service centre (CSV) which, in terms of function and organisation, over a wide range, contains all the social and economic environmental variables to be monitored in any NPOs. The findings appear to suggest an innovative model of sustainability report for NPOs with a significant set of indicators that offer a new disclosure of the activity carried on by the organisation. The work is tested only on a limited number of NPOs which can be extended in the future. Then, as there are many entities similar to CSV around Europe, it is necessary also to set up the model in other countries.