The present process creates the illusion of rights. I'm hopeful the committee will see the need for far greater flexibility in a system that gives the rightful owners of a public company one chance a year to bring change. When reasonable resolutions are repeatedly rejected, the only courses left are to sell or gain control of the board. In too many cases, neither is the best solution. According to Rule 240.14a-8 of SEC rules and regulations, which governs shareholder proposals, if a company can show that a shareholder resolution meets one of thirteen different grounds for exclusions, the company is entitled to disregard the proposal.
Monks is a former CEO of a prominent bank and a veteran corporate director.
Beginning with his appointment by President Ronald Reagan as head of the pension plan division in the Labor Department, Monks has changed the way corporations behave. From his founding of Institutional Shareholder Services, the leading proxy advisory firm, to his pioneering 1992 governance proxy contest against the management of Sears Roebuck and recent activist campaigns by LENS in the U.S. and Hermes LENS in Europe, Monks has established himself as a leading figure in the corporate governance movement. Monks lives in Portland, Maine, and devotes much of his time to traveling across the globe speaking on corporate governance issues. Cambridge University recently established the Robert A. G. Monks Professorship in Corporate Governance in Monks' honor. Monks' fifth book, The New Global Investors, is scheduled for release in June 2001.