Boardroom Governance with Evan Epstein

Joe Grundfest: "Without Luck, Nothing Good Happens."

Episode Summary

In this inaugural episode, I talk with Joe Grundfest, the William A. Franke Professor of Law and Business at Stanford Law School, about his career and experience as a securities regulator, scholar, founder, corporate director and legal advisor. We touched on several governance hot topics, such as his pivotal role with federal-forum selection charter provisions and the Sciabacucchi case, Elon Musk's coverage of D&O insurance for Tesla directors, the rise of stakeholder capitalism and ESG, and distinctions between public and private (venture-backed) company governance. We finished with a round of rapid-fire questions with insights on Joe's overall approach to life.

Episode Notes

  1. Start of Episode [1:31]
  2. Luck and skill: "Without luck nothing good happens" [3:21]
  3. Joe's experience as a Commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission [5:33]
  4. Transition from the S.E.C. to Stanford Law School [8:16]
  5. The story of Financial Engines [11:04]
  6. Taking Financial Engines private [14:54]
  7. The Oracle Derivative Litigation Case (2003) [17:17]
  8. The KKR board [20:19]
  9. The story of Stanford's Directors' College [23:31]
  10. Federal-forum selection charter provisions and the Sciabacucchi case [27:34]
  11. Elon Musk's coverage of D&O insurance for Tesla directors [32:24]
  12. The rise of stakeholder capitalism and ESG [37:55]
  13. Global warming [40:38]
  14. Conflicts of interests in public and private companies [43:17]
  15. Control in startups [48:28]
  16. Rapid-fire questions [50:57]

Joseph A. Grundfest is the William A. Franke Professor of Law and Business at Stanford Law School and is a Senior Faculty of the Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University. Professor Grundfest is a nationally prominent expert on capital markets, corporate governance, and securities litigation. 

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Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License