| The group of independent directors has been questioned as "not independent but not knowledgeable" and "pretty vase".On the one hand,independent directors must be independent from the company’s management and controlling shareholders in order to maintain their independence in terms of personality,economic interests and exercise of power.On the other hand,they must have relevant professional qualities to make independent judgments on issues related to the company based on professional knowledge and experience.Therefore,there is a need to understand empirically the impact of corporate independent directors on corporate development as well as corporate performance,etc.Based on the network-embedded principal-agent model,this paper argues that independent directors of listed companies can be embedded in the internal network of the company to perform the functions of supervision and experts,and thus improve corporate performance.This paper collates and reviews the literature around independent directors,independent directors’ networks and corporate performance that has been developed in current academic circles.Based on the principal-agent theory and mosaic theory,the research hypothesis is proposed and the corresponding empirical model is constructed based on the actual capital market in China.The network of independent directors is divided into internal and external parts,and two mechanisms of independent directors’ monitoring and embedding are selected after relevant screening to study the impact of independent directors’ network on corporate performance.The regression coefficients of independent director independence are significantly positively correlated with corporate performance when the first and second types of agency costs are used as mediating variables,and the two types of agency costs have a significant mediating effect.The regression coefficient of independent directors’ education is positive,and the regression coefficient of independent directors’ degree centrality and independent directors’ structural hole richness are positively related to corporate performance.The innovation of this paper is to take two mechanisms of independent directors’ monitoring and embedding as the entry point,establish a link between the study of independent directors and corporate performance,and study the impact of independent directors’ network on corporate performance.A pathway for independent directors to enhance corporate performance is sought.At the theoretical level,suggestions are made for independent directors to enhance corporate value,and new perspectives are provided for enterprises to improve their corporate governance capabilities. |
