A world-first integrated reporting guidance document was unveiled by Professor Mervyn King in Johannesburg today (Tuesday).The document offers direction to the 400 companies listed on the JSE; companies that are obliged to produce an integrated report for their current financial years.

Integrated reporting is a holistic approach to enable investors and other stakeholders to understand how an organisation is really performing. Addressing the wider as well as longer-term consequences of decisions and actions, an integrated report makes clear the link between financial and non-financial value. 

In 2008 Tomorrows Company published “Tomorrow’s Owners – stewardship of Tomorrow’s Company”. This was a review of the principles of good ownership from private equity and family business to institutional investment in listed companies. The report concluded that shareholders had four roles – being a member, a provider of finance, a trader of shares and a steward, but that in listed companies it was this fourth role that was being neglected. The publication of this report coincided with the failure of the banks in October 2008. Sir David Walker picked up the theme of stewardship in his 2009 report for the UK government on the governance of banks and other financial institutions. Here we set out Tomorrow’s Company’s definition of stewardship and the four principles that make up effective stewardship.    

"All of us whose money is going into the system need to be given the opportunity to exercise some simple choices about stewardship. A consumer who walks down the supermarket aisle can choose to buy Fair Trade coffee, and they know what that means. The same should happen when we look at products offered us by fund managers: we should be able to tell the stewardship content," – Mark Goyder, Founder Director of Tomorrow’s CompanyAn article published in The Guardian newspaper (on 21/6/11) - featuring contributions and comment from Mark Goyder - sets out the expectation that Business Secretary Vince Cable will use his speech to the Association of British Insurers on Wednesday (22/6/11) to renew his calls for UK plc to take a more long term view of its activities.

This publication champions the concept of a ‘mandate’ which sets out the ‘essence’ of the ‘character’ and distinctiveness of the company. We believe that this ‘working charter’ can help boards navigate their way through increasingly choppy waters by facilitating more effective strategic engagement: primarily between executive directors and NEDs to improve board effectiveness, but with the associated benefit that it drives communication externally with the key stakeholders, including investors, government and regulators, and society at large.