Nicholas Benes: "We Need to Redesign the Corporation to Provide Better Incentives"

In this episode, I talk with Nicholas Benes, the Founder of the Board Director Training Institute of Japan. Nick has a background in both law and business (he has a JD/MBA from UCLA, and a BA from Stanford), he is bilingual in Japanese and English, and has served on a number of boards in Japan since the year 2000. He gained broad experience in investment banking during 11 years at JP Morgan, in New York, London and Tokyo, after which he founded his boutique M&A advisory firm in Tokyo. Nick is one of the leading corporate governance experts in Japan and has been active in policy advocacy in the region. We focus this discussion on the evolution of corporate governance in Japan, including his role in promoting the new corporate governance code, and other general topics such as executive compensation, ESG, dual class share structures and his recent proposal to redesign incentives in corporations by creating an “externalization/bankruptcy trust fund” or “ESG dividend fund.” This proposal has been published and is available at the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance Blog.