Miwako Nitani

Miwako Nitani is an Associate Professor of Finance (entrepreneurial finance) at the Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa. Her research areas include banking, small business lending, government initiatives, venture capital, behavioral finance, and corporate social responsibility. Dr. Nitani’s research has been funded by a number of tri-council research grants and often in collaboration with government or para-public agencies, such as Innovation, Science and Economic Development of Canada (ISED) and Export Development Canada (EDC). It has led to publications in the form of book chapters, papers in international conference proceedings and articles in peer-reviewed academic journals such as Small Business Economics and the Journal of Small Business Management. Her research has also helped inform public policies, including the Canada Small Business Financing (CSBF) Program; the Business Development Bank of Canada’s deployment of venture capital (VC) investment; Export Development Canada (EDC)’s VC investment strategy. Dr. Nitani participated in the most recent parliamentary review of the mandate of the Business Development Bank of Canada (confidential unpublished report). Her teaching areas include valuation, venture capital and private equity, financing new ventures, international finance and statistics.

Corporate social responsibility and firm performance

Professor Nitani seeks highly motivated, reliable, and meticulous graduate students interested in the topics such as corporate social responsibility, behavioural finance, and small business financing.

• How does corporate social responsibility related to firm performance?

• What is the role of the media with respect to corporate social responsibility?

• To what extent are social responsibility ratings, those assigned to corporations by third party rating agencies, reliable?

• In what ways do corporations respond to negative social/environmental incidents and how do the markets reacts to these responses?

• Does the corporation’s level of social responsibility affect its ability to raise capital?