While reformers have argued that multiple directorships for executives can destroy value, we investigate firms with executives that accept an outside directorship and find negative announcement returns only when the executive's firm has greater agency problems. When fewer agency concerns exist, additional directorships relate to increased firm value. Announcement returns are also higher when executives accept an outside directorship in a financial, high-growth, or related-industry firm. Our results suggest that outside directorships for executives can enhance firm value, which has important implications for firms employing executives nominated for outside boards and for policy recommendations restricting the number of directorships. Copyright 2005 by The American Finance Association.
Research Summary: This study reexamines the relation between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and financial performance by benchmarking firms against industry peers in a given year to identify best-in-class and worst-in-class firms. We also address distributional
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