Enlightened value maximizationA theory that recognizes that corporate decision-makers need to be more sensitive to nonshareholder constituencies, that maximizing shareholder value does not produce the most value for the organization. recognizes that communication with and motivation of an organization’s managers, employees, and partners is extremely difficult. What this means in practice is that if we simply tell all participants in an organization that its sole purpose is to maximize value, we will not get maximum value for the organization. Value maximizationThe maximization of a corporation’s common stock by increasing the wealth of that corporation’s shareholders. is not a vision or a strategy or even a purpose; it is the scorecard for the organization. We must give people enough structure to understand what maximizing value means so that they can be guided by it and therefore have a chance to actually achieve it. They must be turned on by the vision or the strategy in the sense that it taps into some human desire or passion of their own—for example, a desire to build the world’s best automobile or to create a film or play that will move people for centuries. All this can be not only consistent with value seeking, but a major contributor to it.Jensen (2001), p. 16.

Indeed, it is a basic principle of enlightened value maximization that we cannot maximize the long-term market value of an organization if we ignore or mistreat any important constituency. We cannot create value without good relations with customers, employees, financial backers, suppliers, regulators, and communities. But having said that, we can now use the value criterion for choosing among those competing interests. I say “competing” interests because no constituency can be given full satisfaction if the firm is to flourish and survive. Moreover, we can be sure—again, apart from the possibility of externalities and monopoly power—that using this value criterion will result in making society as well off as it can be.Jensen (2001), p. 16.

In this way, enlightened stakeholder theorists can see that although stockholders are not some special constituency that ranks above all others, long-term stock value is an important determinant (along with the value of debt and other instruments) of total long-term firm value. They would recognize that value creation gives management a way to assess the tradeoffs that must be made among competing constituencies, and that it allows for principled decision making independent of the personal preferences of managers and directors.Jensen (2001), p. 17.