이사회의 특성이 연구개발투자 의사결정에 미치는 효과

The Effect of Board Attributes on Decision-Making for R&D Investment

연구개발투자는 기업성장의 원천임에도 불구하고, 경영자는 이를 회피하려는 유인을 가진다. 이러한 점을 활용하여, 여러 선행연구에서는 연구개발비를 대리인 비용의 척도로 활용해 왔다. 본 연구는 이사회의 특성이 경영자의 연구개발투자 의사결정에 미치는 효과를 분석했다. 우선 이사회의 특성을 체계적으로 분석할 수 있는 논리적 틀을 제안하고, 이를 바탕으로 이사회 관련변수를 구축했다. 특히, 다수의 선행연구에서 이사회 독립성의 대용치로 사용해온 사외이사비율의 측정방법에 문제가 있을 수 있음을 강조하고, 전통적 사외이사비율로부터 “관계이사”를 구분할 것을 제안했다. 2003년부터 2005년까지 한국증권거래소에 상장된 제조기업 955개의 표본을 대상으로 실증 분석한 결과, 이사회 내의 “독립된 사외이사비율”, 이사회 내의 “위원회 수”가 증가할수록 연구개발투자는 증가하는 것으로 나타났다. 반면, 이사회 내의“사내이사비율”, 이사회 내의 “관계이사비율”, 임원경력을 가진 “독립된 사외이사비율”, 이사회 내의 “고령임원의 비율”이 증가할수록, 연구개발투자는 감소하는 것으로 나타났다. 이사회의 리더십 구조의 경우, 연구개발투자와 통계적인 관련성이 없는 것으로 나타났다. 증권거래법 제191조 16에서는 이사회의 설계와 관련된 의무규정을 명시하고 있다. 본 연구는 이러한 관련법규의 영향을 분석결과에 반영하고자 추가분석을 실시했다. 분석 결과, 사외이사의 구성에 있어서는 의무규정의 영향력이 존재하지 않는 것으로 나타났으나, 위원회의 설치와 관련해서는 의무규정의 영향력이 존재하는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 관계이사 분리의 타당성을 검정하기위해, 전통적 방식으로 측정한 사외이사비율 변수를 포함하는 모형과 본 연구에서 제안한 “독립된 사외이사비율”변수를 포함하는 모형의 설명력을 비교․평가했다. 분석결과, 전통적 사외이사비율로부터 “관계이사”를 분리하여 측정하는 것이 보다 바람직하다는 것을 확인할 수 있었다. 또한 전문경영자 집단과 소유경영자 집단의 구분에 기초한 추가분석이 수행되었다. 분석결과, 이사회의 특성과 연구개발투자와의 관계는 소유경영자 집단 보다는 전문경영자 집단에서 보다 명확하게 나타나는 것으로 나타났다.

The investment for research and development is not only the driving force of firm growth but also the source of competitive advantage. However, the managers have incentives to reduce R&D expenditure because the success of R&D investment is uncertain and the benefits of R&D investment will be taken in the long term. According to agency theory, as the investment opportunities of stockholders are well-diversified, risk-neutral stockholders prefer R&D investment toward high returns whereas managers whose human resources are dependent on their companies are reluctant to invest the resources to R&D. Managers make decisions to invest only in case benefits are greater than costs, that is, comparing personal benefits from R&D investment to personal costs. However, in general, R&D investment has negative impacts on short-term oriented accounting profits, so managers who are evaluated largely by accounting profits can be likely to avoid the unfavorable rewards in current period. That’s why managers are least likely to invest the resources to R&D, for fear that they will be evaluated negatively at their job market. In this context, several prior researches have used R&D expenditure as the measure of agency costs, and paid a lot of attentions to find the ways to bring about optimal level of R&D investment through the reduction of agency costs.12)37 The internal control systems to reduce agency costs can be divided into two categories：monitoring and incentive contracts(including the issues of ownership structure). The representative means to monitor managers is the board of directors, and this paper has a purpose of finding out how the board attributes can have an impact on R&D investment, focusing on the monitoring mechanism of the board of directors. Based on the literature review of Zahra & Pearce(1989), this paper suggested the framework for empirical tests to analyze the board attributes systematically, and built the variables related to board attributes. As a result, the board attributes were classified into four categories：board compositions, board characteristics, board structures, and decision-making processes. For the empirical analysis, except for the decision-making processes, five variables were selected in the areas of board compositions, board characteristics, and board structures. The board compositions include the authentically independent outside directors’ ratio, the grey directors’ ratio, and the inside directors’ ratio. The board characteristics also include the ratio of outsiders with former executive careers, and the ratio of directors over retirement age. The number of board committees and the leadership structure are considered as the indicators of the board structures. The empirical results of this study were as followed. The authentically independent outside directors’ ratio had a significant positive effect on R&D expenditure statistically. This result interpreted that the assurance of the board of directors’ independence made it possible to monitor the mangers’ decision-making for R&D investment effectively and efficiently, and then R&D expenditure increased. The grey directors’ ratio had a significant negative effect on R&D expenditure statistically.It was regarded that the grey directors were unable to monitor managers effectively and efficiently due to the absence of substantial independence though they were classified into outside directors seemingly. The inside directors’ ratio had a significant negative effect on R&D expenditure statistically, which meant that the inside directors were not effective and efficient in monitoring roles. The ratio of outsiders with former executive careers showed a significant negative effect on R&D expenditure statistically. As discussed in the social network theory, it seemed that social networking process among the directors made directors’ monitoring roles ineffective and inefficient though the directors were outsiders. This evidence should be