Corporate Governance and Risk Management: Lessons (Not) Learnt from the Financial Crisis

Abstract

The paper aims to understand if and which lessons have been learned since the financial crisis of 2007–2008, highlighting the main deficiencies which still affect the corporate governance and risk management systems more than a decade after. A survey was performed by collecting the answers to 15 questions about corporate governance and risk management practices, given by a representative sample of 200 finance professionals (100 from the USA, 50 from Italy, 50 from the UK). The survey allows saying that corporate governance codes and risk management approach, even though improved and implemented over the past decade, still present problems in terms of principles or application. The results provide insights into how corporate governance issues are addressed and how financial institutions and regulators learn and adapt from a crisis. The paper also gives new perspectives on corporate governance, indicating where regulators need to focus on to rethink the governance mechanisms.