The Board Director Training Institute of Japan - Representative Director
http://bdti.or.jp/english
Japan (Tokyo)
Portfolio
Nicholas Benes
Representative Director, The Board Director Training Institute of Japan
President, JTP Corporation
Governor, American Chamber of Commerce in Japan
Nicholas Benes heads up The Board Director Training Institute of Japan (BDTI), a newly-founded non-profit foundation. BDTI aims to help Japanese firms improve their corporate governance so as to better compete in world markets, by: (a) offering courses that combine governance theory and practice with leading-edge knowledge about the management issues that are the subject of oversight, such as strategy, finance, risk management, and succession planning; and (b) providing E-Learning courses so that companies can spread “corporate governance culture” throughout their organizations at low cost. To accomplish the former, BDTI has joined forces with UCLA Anderson Executive Education and major accounting and law firms. BDTI’s other mission is to spread knowledge about corporate governance by offering an internet discussion forum, a documents/data library, speaker events, and public seminars. Increasing broad-based awareness in Japan about the societal benefits - in terms of safety, the environment, and economic welfare - of healthy governance is essential to restoring confidence in markets and corporations, and to improving ESG standards in Japan. BDTI is the only group certified by the Japanese government as a tax-exempt “public interest organization” with respect to its activities.
Mr. Benes has served as an “outside director” on a number of corporate boards in Japan. He is also President and founder of JTP Corporation, an independent consulting firm in Tokyo that advises Japanese and foreign clients on M&A transactions. Before founding JTP, he worked as an investment banker at JP Morgan for 11 years. Mr. Benes received his B.A. in political science from Stanford University, and a JD-MBA degree from UCLA. He is an inactive member of the Bar in NY and CA, and is fluent in Japanese. He frequently writes articles in the Wall Street Journal and other publications.