HARP Seminar: Analyzing the determinants of non-financial information disclosure in the integrated report from the viewpoint of content elements: Evidence from Japan

Free to attend

Location: 208 Henley Business School, Whiteknights campus.

Seminar start: 14:00

Abstract:

This paper investigates the relationship between the disclosure rate of non-financial measures and the four determinants that influence management decision to disclose such measures: (1) managerial significance, (2) the importance of measurement, (3) measurement difficulties and (4) the impact on financial figures. This study explores whether critical non-financial measures for medium- to long-term value creation are fully, or to what extent, disclosed in the integrated report (IR). Though published articles surrounding this topic are already in circulation, many researchers present normative arguments for the IR whilst there is little research examining the practice of IR itself (e.g. Dumay et al., 2016; KPMG, 2018). Thus, this paper examines current IR practice in Japan and explores which elements hinder companies' attempts to disclose such measures and how to enhance disclosure practices of those measures, based on questionnaire data analysis. The author finds that many companies connect existing reports, such as the annual report and CSR report, into an integrated report, therefore more effective representation of business dynamics in a value creation context is needed. Further, the result suggests that companies refrain from addressing specific technology-related information when it has a high managerial significance, as it includes confidential matters advantageous to them. Besides, the result confirms that creating KPIs on a content element, such as the organizational overview element, leads to the enhancement of the integrated report.

Keywords: Integrated report, Non-financial information, Value Creation, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Sustainability, Accountability

Bio:

Tadanori Yosano is associate professor at the Graduate School of Business Administration at Kobe University in Japan; and visiting scholar of the Research Institute of Capital Formation, Development Bank of Japan. His fields of interest in research are within accounting for intangibles, intellectual capital reporting as well as soft information role in bank-firm relationship. He received a Bachelor’s degree in economics at Kyoto University in 1994 and a Ph.D. in business administration at Kobe University in 2002. He was research fellowship for young scientists at Japan Society for the Promotion of Science from April 1999 to March 2002. He is teaching financial accounting and international accounting. His major English articles include:

“Outperforming markets: IC and the long-term performance of Japanese IPOs” (with Christian Nielson and Gunner Rimmel, Accounting Forum, Volume. 39, No. 2, pp. 83-96, 2015

“Analysts’ perceptions of intellectual capital information” (Sakakibara, Shigeki, Bo Hansson and Hideo Kozumi), Australian Accounting Review, Volume. 20, No. 3, pp. 274-185, 2010

“Intellectual capital disclosures in Japanese IPO prospectuses” (with Gunner Rimmel and Christian Nielson), Journal of Human Resource Costing & Accounting, Volume. 13, No. 4, pp.316-337

His English book publication includes:

“Reporting on intangibles, a recent survey from Japan,” in Intellectual Capital in Organizations: Non-Financial Reports and Accounts (Patricia Ordoñez de Pablos and Leif Edvinsson, eds.) Routledge, pp. 182-202, 2015

Awards:

PriceWaterHouseCoopers Award for the “Best Junior Contribution to the Development of Intangibles and IC theory and Practice” for the paper entitled “Influence of Intellectual Capital Information on Credit Risk Rating Process/Criterion and Credit Conditions -Survey Analysis of Japanese Financial Institutions,” 4th European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management Workshop on “Visualising, Measuring, and Managing Intangibles and Intellectual Capital,” Hasselt (Belgium), 22-24 October 2008.