????通常人們都認為“高層決策英明”和“公司治理有序”這類口號沒有實際意義；但在危機當中，這些話聽起來既順耳又有力。

????重大危機襲來時，僅僅對公司的管理或決策進行修修補補無濟于事，而需要對公司的治理和決策進行徹底的改革。新聞集團（News Corp）目前的處境就是如此。

????因此，新聞集團將在目前的董事會成員中委派來治愈公司管理上存在的弊病？人們對此頗為好奇。

????有人建議，深陷泥潭的新聞集團要解決公司的治理問題，董事會成員湯姆?珀金斯應該是股東的“救命稻草”。

????他果真是最佳人選嗎？從1996年起，湯姆?珀金斯便成為新聞集團董事會成員。在過去15年中，他對公司的治理一直發揮著巨大的影響。他也是新聞集團三個董事委員會的成員，是唯一一位擁有這一資格的董事。顯然，他對公司高層的決策制定也要負一定的責任。

此君在惠普的業績不盡如人意

????珀金斯曾在惠普公司（HP）擔任董事，并于2006年5月辭職。他認為公司能招募到馬克?赫德并出任CEO，自己功不可沒。而且珀金斯也為赫德在新聞集團謀得了一個董事會席位。（赫德從惠普公司辭職后，也退出了新聞集團董事會，當時惠普公司董事會正就他的作風問題對他進行調查。）

????在赫德因為丑聞而失寵之前，珀金斯曾一度是惠普公司電話竊聽丑聞的主角。公司針對董事向媒體泄露機密信息展開調查后，這一丑聞才得以曝光。

????《紐約時報》（New York Times ）于5月24日公布的一份文件中記載了惠普公司的泄密調查，文件顯示，珀金斯對于調查提出了自己的處理建議，他提議使用測謊儀，并對泄密者的身份多有猜測，但目標搖擺不定。他還對董事會處理調查結果的方式提出來自己的觀點。

????盡管珀金斯對調查表現出濃厚的興趣，但作為惠普公司的董事會成員和治理委員會主席，事關調查過程和程序的監督他又做了哪些努力？《新聞周刊》（Newsweek ）曾引用他在一封信中的說法，稱這次丑聞是公司“董事會程序違規，公司治理的崩潰”。那么，他在其中又發揮了什么作用？

????2008年，在接受《首席執行官》雜志（Chief Executive）采訪時，他談到了惠普的丑聞：“我堅決反對董事會泄密，而且我本人從來沒有泄露過公司的任何機密?！彼€認為“泄密通常是指‘泄露’負面的‘機密’信息?！?/p>

????但據2007年《紐約客》（New Yorker）的一篇文章描述，2005年，他對時任惠普CEO的卡莉?菲奧莉娜坦白，自己曾經把董事會關于菲奧莉娜績效的審議意見細節透露給一名《華爾街日報》（Wall Street Journal）的記者。文章稱，盡管珀金斯表示，當時那名記者已經掌握了許多詳細信息，但他還是向菲奧莉娜“表達了歉意”。

????2006年5月底，從惠普公司辭職后，在給獵頭安德里亞?雷蒙德和當時新聞集團董事會所有成員發送的郵件中，珀金斯披露了關于惠普公司董事會審議的保密信息。安德里亞?雷蒙德被認為是赫德加入惠普的牽線人。

惠普的輻射效應

????《紐約客》的文章稱，珀金斯在2006年5月18日的董事會會議上提出辭職后，便與一位外部法律顧問談論了自己離開董事會的原因。當時，他表示辭職是因為私人原因（僅限于他本人與董事會主席之間），并不是與公司存在爭議，因此外部法律顧問只需宣布他辭職，但無需公布原因?！久绹C券交易委員會（SEC）后來曾指責惠普公司未能在開始階段詳細披露珀金斯離職的具體原因。】

????珀金斯在7月18日的一封郵件中稱，他曾要求，僅由他和董事會主席兩個人來負責處理惠普泄密調查的結果，而不是整個董事會。

????但時任惠普公司董事會主席的帕特麗夏?鄧恩沒有同意他的要求。在接受《紐約客》采訪時，鄧恩表示：“湯姆對公司治理的觀點是：應該由少數人……制定決策……這是硅谷牛仔的做事方式?！绷硗庵档米⒁獾囊稽c是：鄧恩在接任惠普公司董事會主席一職時，曾詢問時任公司治理委員會負責人的珀金斯，“公司章程與董事手冊是否一致”，但“據珀金斯回憶，他當時的回復是：‘我沒讀過，我也沒打算去讀。’”

????2007年，珀金斯曾在《華爾街日報》一個專欄中發表過關于公司治理的文章，他在文中表示，自己支持的模式，與專注于法律問題的合規董事會有非常大的不同。他寫道：“我曾經在關鍵時刻辭退了一家公司的審計師，靠的就是我的‘嗅覺’?！?/p>

????盡管他信賴自己的嗅覺，但他卻未能及時發現并扼殺惠普的竊聽丑聞，或者新聞集團的冒險文化和行為。

????所以，或許珀金斯并不是拯救新聞集團于危難的最佳人選。要幫助新聞集團擺脫困境，不僅需要具備應對危機的專業知識，還要足夠老練，但很明顯，這并不是他的特長。

珀金斯的替補

????既然珀金斯難當大任，還有誰能拯救困境中的新聞集團？跳出來看，鑒于大部分董事一直以來與新聞集團的關系或他們漫長的任期，他們普遍缺乏獨立性。

????韋亞特?丁恩是美國喬治城大學的法學教授，截止目前，他在新聞集團董事會的任職時間已長達7年。珀金斯從惠普公司離職后，丁恩曾為他提供過建議。他在2006年9月《華爾街日報》發表的一篇評論文章中稱：“從此以后，沒有人，尤其是美國公司，敢于聲稱自己不知道未經許可獲得他人的電話記錄是錯誤和違法的?！?/p>

????但是早在2005年，公眾就首次對新聞集團的電話竊聽表達了憂慮，當時獨立董事的監督何在？而針對之后警方的調查，董事會又提供了哪些監督？

????他們使用了丁恩在評論文章中吹噓的“董事行為的指路明燈：商業判斷”？還是僅僅依賴管理層？

????上周五之前，面對危機，新聞集團的反應是保持沉默。當然，他們關閉了《世界新聞報》（News of the World），并放棄了本來就勝算不大的英國天空電視臺（BSkyB）的收購計劃，但是丑聞當頭，首要任務到底是什么？難道是回購股票嗎？

????上周五，新聞國際公司（News International）首席執行官兼《世界新聞報》總編麗貝卡?布魯克斯辭職，之后新聞集團旗下道瓊斯集團（Dow Jones）的CEO萊斯?辛頓也宣布辭職。萊斯?辛頓曾擔任新聞國際公司CEO。

????目前，新聞集團正在開展公關攻勢。但公司董事會的變化體現在哪里？公司內部是否又進行了有意義的審查？

????現在，新聞集團董事會完全可以徹底換血。

????首要任務之一是重新設定CEO、董事會和審計委員會的目標與職責。

????目前，“新聞集團的審計委員會負責審查公司關于風險評估與風險管理的政策和執行，[但]確定公司風險承受能力的適當級別卻是首席執行官和高級管理層的職責。”

????新聞集團是時候成立獨立董事會了；同時，要讓獨立董事會參與到令人滿意的風險管理以及其他事務中去。

????如果不對董事會做出改革，那么對于默多克家族和他們的雇員來說，不論他們是否身處董事會，都將無法擺脫目前的困境。

????這個龐大的媒體帝國應該開啟新的篇章了。

????本文作者愛麗諾?布洛斯罕是董事會咨詢機構價值聯盟和公司治理聯盟（The Value Alliance and Corporate Governance Alliance，http://thevaluealliance.com/）的首席執行官。

????The "right tone at the top" and "good governance." Although these phrases are often brushed off as meaningless, in the midst of crisis, these phrases sound both sweet and powerful.

????When a major crisis hits, as is currently the case with News Corp (NWS), it is no longer possible to simply perform touch-up repairs to a company's governance practices or tone. These things often need to be remade whole cloth.

????And that is why it is curious that any current board member would be considered apt to fix News Corp's governance woes.

????It has been suggested that, to fix governance at the beleaguered company, News Corp. board member Tom Perkins is shareholders' "best hope."

????But would he make the best choice? He's been on the News Corp board since 1996 and he has already had 15 years to influence governance there. He sits on all three of News Corp's board committees, the only director with that distinction. Certainly, he has had some level of responsibility for the tone at the top.

A less-than-stellar record at Hewlett-Packard

????Perkins, who was a director at HP (HPQ) before his resignation in May 2006, has said that he helped recruit Mark Hurd to the CEO spot at that company. Perkins also helped Hurd get a News Corp board seat. (Hurd left the News Corp board after his resignation from HP amid an HP board investigation into his ethical conduct.)

????Prior to Hurd's scandal and fall from grace, Perkins was at the center of the earlier HP pretexting, or spying, scandal, which began as an investigation into leaks of confidential information to reporters.

????A May 24 document describing HP's secret leak investigations that was published by the New York Times indicates that Perkins made suggestions about how to handle the secret investigations, recommending the use of lie detectors, and sharing his views, which changed over time, on the potential source of the leaks and how the board should handle the outcome of its investigation.

????Given Perkins' active interest, what efforts, as a board member and as chair of HP's governance committee, did he make to oversee the investigation's processes and procedures? What was his role in what he has characterized in a letter cited by Newsweek as "improper board procedures and breakdowns in corporate governance" at the company?

????"I am categorically against leaking from boards, and I was not involved in any of the leaks," he told Chief Executive magazine in a 2008 interview, referring to the HP scandal, saying "a leak usually [refers to revealing] negative stuff that is [confidential]."

????But, according to a 2007 New Yorker article, he confessed to then-CEO Carly Fiorina that he had spoken to a Wall Street Journal reporter in 2005 about details of board deliberations concerning Fiorina's performance. Although Perkins said the reporter already had many of the details, "Perkins apologized" to Fiorina, the article said.

????After resigning from HP's board, Perkins sent emails in late May 2006 that revealed information from confidential HP board discussions to a headhunter named Andrea Redmond, who was credited with bringing Hurd to HP, and to all of the then-members of the News Corp board.

The HP fallout

????Immediately following his resignation at HP's May 18, 2006 board meeting, Perkins had a conversation with outside counsel about the reason he left the board, according to the New Yorker article. At that time, he said it was personal (between him and the chair), not a dispute with the company, and outside counsel should just say he resigned. (The SEC later rebuked HP for failing to fully disclose the reasons for Perkins' resignation early on.)

????Perkins said in an email on July 18 that he requested that just he and the board chair, rather than the full board, handle the outcome of the leak investigation at HP.

????Patricia Dunn, HP's chair at the time, did not comply. "Tom's view of corporate governance is that a few people … should make the decision…. That's the Silicon Valley cowboy way," Dunn told the The New Yorker. Another concerning sign: When Dunn became chair of HP, she had asked Perkins, who headed the governance committee at the time, about "inconsistencies between the company by-laws and the director's handbook." "Perkins recalls replying, 'I've never read either one, nor do I intend to.'"

????Perkins wrote about his views on governance in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in 2007, expressing his belief in a model that is very different from a "Compliance Board, with its focus on legal issues." "As a director who once fired a firm's auditors just in the nick of time, I relied upon the 'smell-factor'," he wrote.

????Despite his reliance on it, his smell factor didn't work quickly enough, however, to sniff out and snuff out the pretexting at HP or the risky culture and behavior at News Corp.

????Perkins may not be the best fit to solve News Corp's woes. Moving forward will require not only expertise in handling a crisis but also tact, and that is not necessarily his strongest suit.

Alternatives to Perkins

????If not Perkins, then who might be able to dig News Corp. out of its mess? Looking farther afield, the majority of directors currently lack independence, measured by current or past relationships to News Corp, or through their long tenure on the board.

????Viet Dinh -- a Georgetown Law Professor who advised Perkins following his departure from HP -- is a seven-year veteran of the News Corp board. He wrote in a September 2006 opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal: "Henceforth, no one, least of all corporate America, should be able to claim that they didn't know that obtaining telephone records without consent is improper and illegal."

????But where was independent board oversight of the culture at News Corp when public concerns of telephone hacking first arose in 2005? And what oversight did the board provide related to the police inquiries that followed?

????Did they use the "the guiding light of director conduct: business judgment," which Dinh touts in his opinion piece – or did they simply rely on management?

????Before last Friday, the response by News Corp to the crisis was muted. Sure, they closed down News of the World and pulled out of a deal to buy BSkyB that would have likely failed anyway, but what are their priorities -- a stock repurchase in the midst of an ethical scandal?

????On Friday, chief executive of News International and former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks resigned, as did Dow Jones CEO and former News International chief Les Hinton.

????The PR machine is now up and running. But where are the changes in the boardroom or a meaningful internal review?

????Right now, the News Corp board could use a whole new set of independent members.

????One of their first tasks should be to reset the goals and jobs of the CEO, the board, and the

????Currently at News Corp, "the Audit Committee is responsible for reviewing the Company's policies and practices with respect to risk assessment and management, [but] it is the responsibility of the Chief Executive Officer and senior management to determine the appropriate level of the Company's exposure to risk."

????It's time for an independent board to weigh in on acceptable risk management and other practices at this company.

????Until the board changes hands, the Murdochs and those who work for them, both on and off the board, shouldn't be let off the hook.

????It's time for this media empire to turn a new page.

????Eleanor Bloxham is CEO of The Value Alliance and Corporate Governance Alliance (http://thevaluealliance.com/), a board advisory firm.