An Innovative Approach to Stakeholder Theory: application in spanish transnational corporations

Resumen

Objective – This paper describes a different perspective on the
application of stakeholder theory, concentrating only on the interests
of stakeholders rather than on their roles. The purpose of this article
is to provide an option for solving Jensen’s “problem of governance”;
this approach will allow the agent to manage the stakeholders having
ascertained that the needs of stakeholders overlap and, accordingly, the
agent should be able to monitor multiple stakes as they are aligned.
Design/methodology/approach – A Delphi method was used with
the aim to achieve consensus about the interests of stakeholders for
companies in Spain. The confirmatory phase was based on interviews
to test whether the interests identified in the preliminary study match
the interests that the IBEX-35 firms recognized in relation with their
stakeholders.
Findings – The main contributions are: the addition of a new interestbased
perspective to the different classifications made by stakeholder
theory; a solution to the diversity of indicators between stakeholders
and shareholders; and, finally, a proposal for an integrated accounting
system, incorporating economic as well as social issues employing a
common metric (monetary).
Practical implications – A new perspective focusing on stakeholder
interests and the confirmation that interests may converge permits
the control and management of multiple principals in transnational
corporations operating in different countries.
Originality/value – There is a gap in the applicability of stakeholder
management that the interest-based perspective can help resolve;
moreover the monetization of social value is an option to efficiently
manage transnational corporations.