Stakeholder Disclosure in Reference Forms - An Analysis of the Focus of Healthcare Companies on Reporting Their Risk

Resumen

Objective: This study is intended to examine the disclosure about stakeholders in the risk analysis of health sector companies operating in Brazil.

Method: We examined reference Forms published between 2013 and 2017 of 13 health sector companies listed on the Brazilian stock exchange, B3 (Brazil, Bolsa, Balcão). The content analysis proposed by Bardin (2016) was used to highlight the stakeholders present in the reference forms.

Originality / relevance: Despite the risk management and stakeholder management already have an abundant literature, this research provides empirical evidence on how health companies' reference forms highlight their stakeholders. So far, it has not been possible to identify papers that discuss this theme in Brazilian and international literature.

Results: The results showed that the most cited group of stakeholders, as expected, were Clients (appeared in 98% of the forms), Employees and Competitors (each in 95% of documents analyzed). On the other hand, the least mentioned were Partners (68%), Media (65%) and the Community (37%). Finally, the most relevant result refers to the absolute amount of mentions to the listed stakeholders. Clients were cited 867 times, Investors in 851 opportunities and Employees in 811 occasions. The least cited stakeholders were Media, with 106 allusions, and Community, with 53 mentions.

Theoretical/Methodological Contributions: It can be concluded that, as regard to risk management, organizations devote great attention to Customers, Employees and Competitors, as these are most mentioned in the analyzed documents.