Dilemmas, Dilemmas: Practical case studies for Company Directors
by Julie Garland McLellan

ISBN: 9781449921965, Publisher: Great Governance, USA, March 2010
Reviewed by: Stephen Gagelari


There are many problems in life for which there are no uniquely correct resolutions. When the resolution of a problem involves a choice between unattractive alternatives, we call it a dilemma.

Dilemmas are the stuff of corporate governance. Their resolution can be informed by legal principle and accounting practice. But, more often than not, the choice to be made is one of judgment. And the judgment to be formed is one on which reasonable and informed minds can, and often do, differ.

Julie Garland McLellan's Dilemmas, Dilemmas presents us with dilemmas: pithy problems, based on real-life corporate governance scenarios, for which there is no uniquely correct resolution and for which any resolution involves a choice between alternatives revealing themselves with varying degrees of negative attraction. It then presents us with a range of reasonable and informed responses to those problems. It then invites us to form our own judgment.

The problems are attractively presented in an uncluttered and personal way. They are presented as the problems of David, Suzanne, Tim, Jane and others; over twenty in all, never more than a page in length. To each problem there are three similarly short straightforward and personalised responses by acknowledged corporate government experts. The responses are considered, varied and illuminating in their content. The overall result is a book that is at once highly readable and highly thought-provoking. The reader is left ultimately to resolve the dilemmas it illustrates but the reader is better equipped to do so through a sharing of the insights of others.

The final paragraph, by way of disclaimer, explains that the purpose of the book is to educate and entertain. It does both, and to a high degree.


i Stephen Gageler SC is the Solicitor General of Australia