Board Busyness and Financial Decisions with Emphasis on Firm’s Life Cycle Stages

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Assistant Professor of Accounting, Jahrom University, Shiraz, Iran

2 Ph. D in Accounting, Shahid Chamran University of Ahwaz, Khuzestan, Iran

Abstract

The board of director’s busyness in the sense of simultaneously being a member of the board in other companies is one of the manager’s characteristics in the corporate governance mechanisms of a company, which has also been considered in recent studies. The aim of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the busyness of the board members and financial decisions and the moderating effect of life cycle stages on this relationship. Statistical analysis was done using sample data consisting of 174 companies accepted in Tehran Stock Exchange during the years 2011 to 2023. To test hypotheses, regression models with least squares estimator and dynamic panel method with generalized moments of moments estimator were used as complementary methods. The results showed that the board of director’s busyness has a positive and significant relationship with the variables of cash holdings, also positive and significant relationship with sales, general and administrative expenses, and a negative and significant relationship with capital expenditures. Also, the findings indicate the moderating role of the stages of the life cycle stages in the relationship between the busyness of the board members with cash holdings and capital expenditures. Supplementary tests confirm the strength of the main results. The results of the research show that caution should be used in recruiting busy members in the structure of the board of directors because a high ratio of busy members causes ineffective decisions such as reducing capital expenditures, increasing cash holdings and increasing sales, general and administrative costs.

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