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Korean Academic Society of Business Administration
[ Article ]
korean management review - Vol. 46, No. 4, pp.1097-1124
ISSN: 1226-1874 (Print)
Print publication date 31 Aug 2017
Received 22 Feb 2017 Revised 12 Jun 2017 Accepted 27 Jun 2017
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17287/kmr.2017.46.4.1097

The Effects of Academic Outside Directors on Firm Performance: Evidence from Korean Chaebol Firms

Jae Yong Shin* ; Sewon Kwon** ; Jeong-Hoon Hyun*** ; Natalie Kyung Won Kim****
*(First Author) Seoul National University jshin@snu.ac.kr
**(Corresponding Author) Seoul National University k4js11@gmail.com
***(Co-Author) NEOMA Business School jeong-hoon.hyun@neoma-bs.fr
****(Co-Author) Seoul National University kwkim21@gmail.com
교수 사외이사가 한국 재벌 기업 성과에 미치는 영향
신재용* ; 권세원** ; 현정훈*** ; 김경원****
*서울대학교 경영대학 경영학과, 주저자
**서울대학교 경영학과 박사과정, 교신저자
***NEOMA Business School, 공저자
****서울대학교 경영학과 박사과정, 공저자

Abstract

We investigate the performance impact of academic outside directors in Korean Chaebol firms. Professors are traditionally considered popular candidates for outside directors in Korea. Indeed, academic directors take up 35% of the board members in the top 10 conglomerates of Korea. However, there are very few studies that investigate the role of academic outside directors regarding their monitoring and advisory role (White, Woidtke, Black, and Schweitzer, 2014; Francis, Hasan, and Wu, 2015). We categorize outside directors that are professors based on their academic backgrounds and observe whether academic directors have an incremental contribution to firm value. We also investigate whether academic directors effectively monitor senior management. Results indicate that academic directors are negatively associated with firm performance, and the existence of academic directors does not necessarily increase monitoring of the executives. We find that firms with academic directors are not related with higher CEO turnover-performance sensitivity or higher pay-for-performance. Instead, we find that firms with academic directors are more likely to manage earnings. Overall, our analysis indicates that academic outside directors do not contribute to the corporate governance of the boards of Korean Chaebol firms. Our paper contributes to the board independence and the board composition literature in Korea (Lee, Shim, and Choi, 2012; Shawn and Jung, 2015).

초록

많은 사람들은 종종 재벌 회사의 사외 이사의 독립성과 효율성에 의문을 제기했다. 상법상 이사회의 50% 이상(자산총액 2조 이상 기업)을 사외이사로 구성해야 하기 때문에 한국 기업들은 상당수의 이사를 사외이사로 채워야 한다. 그러나 어떠한 사외이사를 선임하느냐에 따라 기업의 미래 성과와 여러 경영 정책이 달라질 수 있다.

중앙일보가 2012년에 보도한 기사에 따르면 교수들이 한국 상위 10대기업 이사진의 35% 이상을 차지하고 있다. 교수들은 한국 사회에서 전통적으로 독립적이고 전문성이 있다고 여겨졌기 때문에 사외이사로 적합한 후보군으로 여겨져 왔다. 그러나 이러한 교수-사외이사들이 사외이사로서 효과적으로 경영진을 감시하고 자문하는지에 대해서는 연구가 이루어지지 않았다.

미국에서 소수의 연구자들이 교수-사외이사의 역할에 대해 연구를 수행하였는데, 교수-사외이사가 기업경영에 미치는 역할에 대해 일관된 결론을 도출하지 못하였다 (White et al., 2014; Francis et al., 2015). 기업지배구조가 중요한 이슈인 한국의 재벌기업을 중심으로 교수-사외이사가 기업지배구조에 미치는 영향을 연구하였다는 데 본 연구의 공헌점이 있다. 본 연구에서는 교수-사외이사가 기업가치에 미치는 영향과 교수-사외이사를 선임하는 기업의 특징에 대해 연구를 수행하였다. 또한 교수-사외이사의 경영진 감시기능을 성과-경영진 교체 민감도, 성과-경영진보수 민감도 및 이익조정행태를 이용해서 분석을 수행하였다. 실증결과, 교수-사외이사는 기업가치에 부정적인 영향을 미치는데, 이는 교수-사외이사가 있는 기업들의 경우 성과-경영진 교체 민감도와 성과-경영진보수 민감도가 높지 않고, 이익조정을 감시하는데 취약한 점이 원인으로 나타났다. 요약하면, 본 연구의 실증결과에 따르면 교수-사외이사가 기업지배구조 개선에 큰 역할을 하지 못하는 것으로 나타났다.

Keywords:

Academic Directors, Corporate Governance, Firm Performance, Korean Chaebol

키워드:

교수 사외이사, 기업지배구조, 기업 성과, 재벌

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2015S1A5A2A03047893)

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