1 EURAM presentation, Stockholm, May 2002 TEACHING CORPORATE GOVERNANCE: CHALLENGES FOR RESEARCH AND PRACTICE Morten Huse Norwegian School of Management BI mhuse@online.no and Hans Landström University of Lund Hans.Landstrom@fek.lu.se Boards of directors and corporate governance debates have been highly focused in the business press and even in research, but few universities offer courses on these topics. In this paper a research and teaching model is introduced, and we will show some examples of how such courses may be designed and how they relate to research. Examples are given for executive courses, undergraduate courses and graduate courses. The paper concludes by presenting the second international doctoral course on governance in SMEs. The presentation will encourage a dissemination of experiences among the presenters and the audience about experiences in teaching boards of directors and corporate governance. 1. Introduction Boards of directors and corporate governance issues have recently received considerable attention in the business world as well as in academic research publications. The number of scholarly contributions has increased rapidly. But still, in 1992, Andrew Pettigrew wrote that the work of directors, in and out of the boardroom, is rated as the most under researched management topics. “The study of boards and their directors must rank near the top of any management scholar’s list of priority areas for the 1990s.” However, limited academic training has been offered, and as late as in 1995 Monks and Minow presented what their publishers called the first textbook on corporate governance and boards of directors. Corporate governance definitions vary somewhat depending on the discipline where the definition is used. In general and very broad terms, corporate governance deals with how external stakeholders, internal stakeholders and the board of directors contribute in directing an enterprise (Cadbury 1992, Monks and Minow 1995). The role of shareholders as external stakeholders has received the most attention in the discussion in the finance literature on corporate governance in large corporations. Core questions have been related to the independence of the board members, and the board’s role as a means to control the management of the enterprise on behalf of its shareholders. The debate among business executives in small and medium sized enterprises has had a tendency to focus on the competency of the board members, and the board’s role as a resource for the enterprise.