Four members of the Harvard Law School community were recently named to Directorship Magazine’s second annual Directorship 100 list for their influence on corporate governance.
“Making a list of the most influential individuals in any profession is never easy,” the article says. “Making a list of those who influence how boards operate is made even harder by the fact that so many groups hold sway over corporate governance: the directors themselves, shareholders and their advocates, regulators, board advisors, lawyers, and others.”
Professor Lucian Bebchuk LL.M. ’80 S.J.D. ’84 was selected in the professors category for the second year in a row. He was cited for his work convincing companies to adopt the “Bebchuk Bylaw,” which gives more power to corporate shareholders through the use of the poison pill. AIG, TimeWarner, CVS, Disney, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, and JC Penney have all adopted his proposal. Bebchuk is director of the HLS Program on Corporate Governance.
Visiting professor Leo Strine, Jr., who is a senior fellow at the Corporate Governance Program, was selected in the “regulators and rule makers” category. As a vice chancellor on the Delaware Court of Chancery, he is “known for his sharp pen and well-reasoned rulings.”
Two HLS students — Andrew Tuch LL.M. ’99 S.J.D. ’08 and Jim Naughton ’10 — were also added to the list for their work as co-editors of the Harvard Law School Corporate Governance Blog. The memos and papers the two post on the blog, the magazine says, “provide informed viewpoints, oftentimes from the very sources who are arguing the cases.”
In addition to Bebchuk, Naughton, Strine, and Tuch, the Directorship 100 list includes such well-known figures as Chairman Barney Frank ’77, Chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, SEC Chair Christopher Cox ’76, Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein ’78, activist investor Carl Ichan, and Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman.