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Diversity of Viewpoints Would Provide Needed Insights for Board and Company

Washington, D.C. – Boeing shareholders today rejected a shareholder proposal calling on the company to consider viewpoint diversity when it seeks new board candidates. Shareholder activists with the National Center for Public Policy Research’s Free Enterprise Project (FEP), which submitted the proposal, warn that this move threatens shareholders’ return on investment because it risks allowing Boeing to follow a dangerous trend toward partisan echo chambers in corporate boardrooms.

FEP’s proposal noted that:

boards that incorporate diverse perspectives can think more critically and oversee corporate managers more effectively. By providing a meaningful disclosure about potential Board members, shareholders will be better able to judge how well-suited individual board nominees are for the Company and whether their listed skills, experience and attributes are appropriate in light of the Company’s overall business strategy.…

True diversity comes from diversity of thought. There is ample evidence that the many companies operate in ideological hegemony that eschews conservative people, thoughts, and values. This ideological echo chamber can result in groupthink that is the antithesis of diversity. This can be a major risk factor for shareholders.

FEP’s entire proposal, entitled “True Diversity Board Policy,” as well as the opposition statement from Boeing’s board, are available on pages 68-69 of the company’s proxy statement.

The proposal was presented by FEP Coordinator Scott Shepard at Boeing’s annual shareholder meeting, held virtually today at 9 a.m. Central time. Shepard’s supporting statement, as prepared for delivery, can be read here and heard here.

Scott Shepard

Shepard responded after the meeting:

Boeing has seen in just the last few weeks the importance of having ideological diversity on its board of directors. Boeing is a company that has in the past had a significant and positive impact on the American economy, but it is a company that is in a great deal of trouble today. That trouble is of its own making.

This didn’t stop it last month from seeking an enormous bailout from the federal government, just as the government’s – and all of our – resources are being stretched to their limit as we try to cope with an economy that has largely shut down in response to the COVID-19 virus. There are millions of Americans who are suffering financial and health hardship and even disaster for reasons that have nothing to do with them, over which they have no control.

Nikki Haley, who had been a member of Boeing’s board, recognized that this was a bad move. She knew that Boeing would put itself at serious reputational risk, as well as risk of increased government regulation, oversight and intervention, as a result of this tin-eared request at this perilous time. And so she resigned.

This was immediate, clear and high-level feedback. That sort of feedback will be entirely lacking at least half of the time if Boeing’s board of directors becomes the sort of partisan echo chamber that has developed at many other American companies.

Partisan, agenda-driven management is unwise wherever it is tried. We by this proposal sought to save Boeing from a fate that has befallen too many other American firms.

Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), the nation’s largest proxy advisor, recommended that shareholders vote against FEP’s proposal. Pepsi, CVS, Walmart, Gap, Walgreens, Prudential and JPMorgan Chase have adopted FEP’s proposal.

“For years, ISS has urged its clients to approve any number of liberal shareholder proposals, including liberal board diversity resolutions that essentially call for affirmative action or a quota system. However, it is rejecting our call for viewpoint diversity,” notes Shepard. “This is a clear demonstration that ISS is not a politically neutral force for social good, but a naked proponent of left-wing (and only left-wing) positions. Fund managers and large investors should start looking elsewhere for advice on proxy ballots. ISS isn’t looking out for their best interests, but simply pushing a political agenda. And investors should call their fund managers and demand they use a service other than ISS.”

Today’s Boeing meeting marks the ninth time FEP has participated in a shareholder meeting in 2020.

To support FEP efforts to encourage ideological diversity of corporate boards, please click this image.

Launched in 2007, the National Center’s Free Enterprise Project focuses on shareholder activism and the confluence of big government and big business. Over the past four years alone, FEP representatives have participated in over 100 shareholder meetings – advancing free-market ideals about health care, energy, taxes, subsidies, regulations, religious freedom, food policies, media bias, gun rights, workers’ rights and other important public policy issues. As the leading voice for conservative-minded investors, it annually files more than 90 percent of all right-of-center shareholder resolutions. Dozens of liberal organizations, however, annually file more than 95 percent of all policy-oriented shareholder resolutions and continue to exert undue influence over corporate America.

FEP activity has been covered by media outlets including the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Variety, the Associated Press, Bloomberg, Drudge Report, Business Insider, National Public Radio and SiriusXM. FEP’s work was prominently featured in Wall Street Journal writer Kimberley Strassel’s 2016 book The Intimidation Game: How the Left is Silencing Free Speech (Hachette Book Group).

The National Center for Public Policy Research, founded in 1982, is a non-partisan, free-market, independent conservative think-tank. Ninety-four percent of its support comes from individuals, less than four percent from foundations and less than two percent from corporations. It receives over 350,000 individual contributions a year from over 60,000 active recent contributors. Sign up for email updates here.

Follow us on Twitter at @NationalCenter for general announcements. To be alerted to upcoming media appearances by National Center staff, follow our media appearances Twitter account at @NCPPRMedia.

The post Boeing Shareholders Reject Proposal Seeking Ideological Balance on Board appeared first on The National Center.

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Author: The National Center