The Yale University School of Management established the Yale Center for Corporate Governance and Performance and named Ira M. Millstein director, according to a statement from the school. Mr. Millstein is a senior partner at the law firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges and senior associate dean for corporate governance at the Yale School of Management; he also teaches competitive enterprise and strategy at the school.
The center's initial project will examine how shareholders exercise their fiduciary responsibilities as shareowners, such as participating in proxy voting and engaging in active corporate governance, Mr. Millstein said in an interview. Other activities will examine proxy-voting advisory companies and their work and role in corporate governance. The center is dedicated broadly to examining the role and responsibilities of corporations in society, he said.
The center's 33-member advisory board includes Elliot Schrage, vice president-global communications and public affairs, Google Inc.; Patrick J. Canavan, senior vice president-global governance, Motorola Inc.; Herb Allison, chairman president, and CEO, TIAA-CREF; William Donaldson, former SEC chairman; Harvey Goldschmid, former SEC commissioner and currently a professor at Columbia University Law School; and John C. Bogle, founder and former chairman of Vanguard Group.
Startup financing for the center will come from $20 million in gifts and commitments from individual and corporate donors, including a $10 million gift from David Nierenberg, president, Nierenberg Investment Management, and his wife, Patricia, the statement said. The donation, the single largest gift in the history of the Yale School of Management, will support the David Nierenberg Fund for Corporate Governance and Performance and the Theodore Nierenberg Professorship in Corporate Governance.
