The board of directors play an important role in corporate climate strategy-making and decisions but might also compromise environmental policies to minimize agency cost. This study critically investigates the relationship between the attributes of the board of directors and the degree of sustainability performance for the energy sector as discussed in the literature. Our study cumulates existing knowledge offering important characteristics for a balanced board structure to increase the board’s effectiveness in adopting sustainable initiatives that could reduce the adverse impact of an energy corporation’s operation on the environment. Crucial attributes of the board of directors deemed to be positively associated with the commitment to reduce carbon footprint in the environment have been identified. Based on our extensive analysis of the literature we propose a conceptual framework that measures the influence of the board of directors’ attributes on corporate environmental and social sustainability performance. The proposed framework will be useful as an initial step for top management and regulators to gain a better understanding of the balanced board structure required to achieve the social and environmental sustainability performance of corporations. Further, this paper contributes to a body of knowledge about how the board of directors could play a crucial role in monitoring social and environmental threats.

The study investigates the association between the effectiveness of the board of directors and the likelihood that a company receives a modified audit opinion (as a measure of the quality of companies’ external financial reporting) in Malaysia. The sample companies were extracted from the population of publicly-available information mainly the annual reports of publicly-listed companies on the Bursa Malaysia. 136 firm-year observations listed on Bursa Malaysia were identified to examine the relationship between the effectiveness of the board of directors and a modified audit opinion. Data used in this study are collected from two separate sources – annual reports and Datastream. Any missing financial figure from Datastream was acquired from the annual reports. To test the study’s hypotheses, we use the pooled cross-sectional logistic regression analysis for 136 firm-year observations listed on Bursa Malaysia over the period 2009-2011. The evidence we have uncovered is consistent with the hypothesis that companies with large score of the board of directors’ effectiveness are less possible to receive a modified audit opinion. Therefore, the result confirms that the combined effect of the board of directors’ characteristics has a significant negative association with the likelihood of the companies receiving a modified audit opinion.