Tomorrow’s Company is currently developing a stewardship scorecard to apply to all company boards and shareholders. This is in response to the widespread concern that too many companies – including our banks – failed because of an absence of shareholder engagement and risk management by the directors.As part of this we have developed and applied our own Premiership Stewardship scorecard for clubs currently in the Premiership which you can see in this article.

Corporate governance is not an area usually associated with vision, imagination, or even integrity. This needs to change.In this lecture I have looked at corporate governance through the eyes of William Blake.Blake was a visionary, a man to whom imagination, energy and integrity were central. I argue that much of the compliance burden companies face is self-imposed. Business creates the problem when it begins its approach to every new code by saying “how do we comply” instead of asking “What is the spirit of this code? Do we accept it? If yes, how do we fulfil the spirit?

Something is happening to ownership. Does it matter?  I believe that it does. The way companies behave will shape the health of our society. It is likely – although not inevitable – that the way companies are owned will shape how they behave. Companies are unlikely to get far as a force for good if their owners don’t like the idea! That is why Tomorrow’s Company is exploring the question “What is happening to ownership?”. What do you think?