A law departments that summarizes the ratings of corporate governance groups

A number of organizations rate companies on the quality of their corporate governance (See my post of Dec. 4, 2005 which lists three of them.). These watchdogs include Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), Governance Metrics International, Corporate Library, and Proxy Governance. Each of them has a different perspective on what is good corporate governance and looks at somewhat different information with different algorithms to assess it.

One law department that I encountered during my consulting gathers ratings about its company from several of these organizations. A lawyer pools the ratings every quarter and prepares a summary of their recommendations and findings. That lawyer also develops from the ratings a list of governance measures that the company might wish to institute. A thoughtful practice, in my opinion.