Research Question
Why do directors serve on board? The article explores and tries to understand why top executives agree to serve on board and what factors influences their decisions whether to stay or leave.
Theoretical Background
The author explores the reasons why directors choose to stay or leave boards. He identifies that a combination of two factors that affect director decision, intrinsic and extrinsic motivating factors. These two formulate self-determination theory in which the author relies on and start building arguments explaining why directors serve on board. On the other hand, the author challenge the assumption that major reason for directors exit is involuntary while instead its completely voluntary.(Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).
The author identifies key motivational and de-motivational factors and developed five hypotheses that he explored and tested. 1- Prestige hypothesis that is key motivational factor that affects directors’ decision, since company prestige is generated from company performance, media visibility, and firm size contributed to directors’ self-esteem. 2- The author continues to explore the second motivational hypothesis that is related to directors’ contribution to the firm which gives them the ultimate pride to be part of something big. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).
The remaining three hypotheses identify de-motivational factors. 3- Busyness hypothesis is one of these factors since the required time, effort and commitment by the individual while serving on board reflects negatively. 4- Firm reputation and financial results are another factor that the author developed his hypothesis. 5- The author identifies his fifth hypothesis that is related to firm performance and illegitimate firm acts which affects individual motivations. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).
Research Design:
Study Settings & Sample:
This study was conducted on random sample that included in Risk Metrics. Moreover the author selected 30% of the outside directors and conducted full board appointment data for each director. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).
Study Design and analysis
The author utilized longitudinal set of data over period of time through relying on quantitative data and analysis to understand various motivations and how to it influence individual decision to stay or leave. The quantitative analysis was gathered through sampling and empiricism research methods in order to generalize the results. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012). Data Analysis:
The analysis of the motivation factors were classified according to (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).into three components: Dependent Variable, Independent variable and controlled variables of individuals and firm in order to understand the motivation levels Results:
The author concluded that both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations works in parallel and affect directors’ decision to stay or leave.1- Prestige, self-esteem, media visibility, company performance, influence and commitment are the key motivational factors that influence positively directors’ motivation. 2- While busyness, commitment and company performance de-motivate the individuals and they are likely to leave. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).

Prestige Hypothesis 1 | 1a | 1b | 1c | 1d | Supported | Supported | Supported | Supported | | | | | Influence and Commitment Hypothesis 2 | Partially Supported | | | | | Busyness Hypothesis 3 | 3a | 3b | Supported | Supported | | | | | Reputational and financial risk Hypothesis 4 | Not Supported | | | | | Moderating Effects of Reputational and Financial Risk on the Motivating Effects of Prestige- Hypothesis 5 | Partially Supported |

Contribution to knowledge:
The author aims from this research to generate novel predictions and tries to understand the factors behind directors’ exits that weren’t researched before. He aims to showcase that directors serving on board influence positively firm performance during their service. As a result, the research proved that prestige, media visibility, company performance does affect directly these motives in positive manner along to their personal contribution to the firm. However, negative company performance wasn’t directly influenced their motives except in crisis situations.(Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).
On the other hand, the author confirmed his assumption that most exits are voluntary with some exceptions. Demotivating factors were researched and the author supported this argument that directors’ exit links directly to individuals who serves in another influence role which tends to increase their busyness and ultimately demotivating them.
Finally, the author contributed to agency theory with respect to corporate governance in which he unveiled set of various motivation factors affected individuals’ decision through utilizing self-determination theory in understanding these motivations.
Critical examination and thinking
Authors question where quite researched previously as stated by other researches like, “New directions in corporate governance research” and “Board decisions to dismiss reputationally compromised directors.”(Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012). All researches failed to consider the reasons individual exit. These studies provided limited understanding to such exits during non-crisis and focuses only on extrinsic motivations. The author research is signification to uncover the reasons and what are the influences that affect directors’ motivation.(Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).

The research question was quantitatively evaluated and produced hard numbers however it was limited to the research questions that were conducted hence we are missing the bigger picture. The author could explore answering the question through qualitative method to explore “why” which could capture better understanding of the situation that lead to answering the question.

Finally the author do answers his question of why directors serves on board through only evaluating the motivating factors that are related to prestige and company performance. The research will have been granted ethics approval because it maintains confidentiality of the data collected, group under research is not considered vulnerable, the topic cannot be considered sensitive and participants interview conducted were anonymity maintained.

Limitations:
The author focuses only on US based directors while might be different factors that influence directors’ decision in other parts of the world. United States of America is an advance country with huge economy. “Too often, SOE Boards are populated with people chosen their political allegiance rather than business acumen.” (Vagliasindi 2008: 3).On the other hand, this study was based on a third part data base in which the author didn’t highlight how reliable is this data (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012). Moreover, the author didn’t identify any difference between genders and what effects females serving on board.” The findings suggest that the ratio of women directors is positively associated with board strategic control. In addition, we find that the positive effects of women directors on board effectiveness” (Nielsen and Huse 2010 : 136).Final observation that the author obtained demographic data, firm size and financial restatements from various recourses in which its not highlighted how credible are these data and when , where, how these researches were conducted. (Boivie, Graffin and Pollock, 2012).

Reference
Sabina Nielsen and Morten Huse. (2010). The Contribution of Women on Boards of Directors: Going beyond the Surface. Corporate Governance , 136–148.
STEVEN BOIVIE,SCOTT D. GRAFFIN,TIMOTHY G. POLLOCK. (2012). TIME FOR ME TO FLY:PREDICTING DIRECTOR EXIT AT LARGE FIRMS. Academy of Management Journal , 1334-1359. Jensen, M. C, & Meckling, W. H. 1976. Theory of the firm; Managerial behavior, agency costs, and ownership structure. Joumal of Einancial Economics, 3:305-350.

Davis, J. H., Schoorman, F. D., & Donaldson, L. 1997. 1356 Academy of Management Journal December Toward a stewardship theory of management. Academy of Management Review, 22: 20-47.

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. 2000. The "what" and "why" of goal pursuits: Human needs and the self-determination of behavior. Psychological Inquiry, 11: 227-268.

Sabina Nielsen and Morten Huse. (2010). The Contribution of Women on Boards of Directors: Going beyond the Surface. Corporate Governance , 136–148.
Maria Vagliasindi. (2008). The Effectiveness of Boards of Directors of State Owned Enterprises in Developing Countries. The World Bank.

Walid Kotaich
ID number: 139041741
Program: MBA Module I: Foundations of Knowledge and Professional Skills

Assignment Question:
Part B: Reflect on the discussions that you have been engaged in with your study group on Blackboard. Using one or more relevant concepts from your module study book (e.g. learning process and styles, time management, thinking, reasoning and creativity), critically examine how these discussions have contributed to your learning.
Word Count: 486

The learning process through the blackboard evolved to shape our academic writing and analysis. Blackboard discussions and topics were gradually building our capabilities through different stages of learning. Initially feeling overwhelmed with information start to increase and hence introduction of team member along to sharing our study schedule came in place. Here were task 1 came in place to help us explore blackboard, locate our partner and engage with the group to help us on a later stage to share our thoughts. Ultimately help us to connect for future brainstorm sessions. Moving forward with our learning we were able to breathe and understand the bigger picture. Here were we move from adaptation to putting our learning into implementation. Task 2 was a perfect example where we started to learn academic thinking and reasoning, here we felt and sensed our new skills to appear. The developments of our academic skills continued towards intermediate stage were we test our capabilities through Task 3. It helps us to appreciate available reading, identifying strength and weaknesses of the study, able to locate the resources, select the appropriate material, taking notes, critically analyze the study, and understanding plagiarism through proper referencing. Here we reached a stage where we fully understand the requirements of final assignment. Blackboard help us develop our knowledge about difference between two epistemology, role of theory and process of building and evaluating it, what types of research designs are used, methods that were conducted for data collection and how ethical were this research. At this stage task 4 came to ensure we understand how to research and utilize university library, understanding what is in depth plagiarism and how important to avoid this through proper referencing, implement critical reading, identification and analysis arguments through utilizing our potential through thinking out of the box in order to explore all possibilities and limitations. Examining the study doesn’t stop here in which ethics in research is very important. Task 5 comes in place for us to develop understanding around research ethics policy to analyze confidentiality of the data, make sure the group used wasn’t considered vulnerable, how sensitive is the topic and were the interviews conducted with the consent of the participations through maintaining anonymity. From my opinion it was a great experience and journey to shape our skills in order to support us for future courses and our final dissertation. However the question that comes to my mind is this enough? Will this knowledge and tools that we were equipped in a short period will 100% support us in future assignments? I feel that this course just gave us the sense of academic writing and now it’s our job to double our efforts in order to keep developing these skills. Finally I do believe that during each course the university should keep nurturing these skills in us across all our studies since most of us we are quite far from studies.