Board secretaries play a crucial role in advancing corporate governance within companies by ensuring that the boards are compliant and that a healthy relationship exists between boards and management in listed companies. Therefore, the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) has informed that it has been collaborating with Hawkamah Institute for Corporate Governance (Hawkamah) in designing and offering a board secretary accreditation program to enable board secretaries to do their jobs in the best possible way.
The program is mandatory for all DFM listed companies, yet strongly recommended for non-listed companies. The 3rd workshop for the third group was concluded, bringing the total number of those who attended the course to 76, while those who passed the accreditation are 49.
Commenting on this successful initiative, HE Essa Kazim, Chairman of Dubai Financial Market said:
Good corporate governance promotes market confidence, helps attract long-term capital and fosters market discipline through appropriate disclosure and transparency. We believe board secretaries have a significant role to play in upholding a company’s governance practices and we seek to support and empower them in this regard.
From his side, HE Hamad Buamim, Chairman of Hawkamah added:
Board secretaries are important drivers of creating governance cultures within their organizations. As such, this role requires more than just the technical competencies. They also need the emotional intelligence, skills and experience to ensure that they know how corporate governance can be effectively implemented in their organizations. We hope that those workshops have provided participants with practical insights on how to overcome such challenges.
The other initiative between the DFM and Hawkamah, board briefings, is also going as planned; with more DFM listed companies using Hawkamah service to keep their boards updated with the latest governance trends and regulations that aim at enhancing board effectiveness.
The DFM and Hawkamah are currently discussing more initiatives that will bring value to companies and their boards. The objective is clear; to make sure that DFM listed companies have high corporate governance standards matching those of the best markets.