Corporate governance and voluntary disclosure: Content analysis on Borsa Istanbul hospitality industry companies

While corporate governance is an important mechanism for the success of any firm, the issue has attracted little interest in tourism sector. Therefore the main aim of this study is to highlight the corporate governance mechanisms of hospitality companies on Borsa Istanbul, so as to provide initial empirical evidence on corporate governance. The findings revealed that although the annual reports must give detailed information about corporate governance indicators, such as board of directors, top management and corporate governance rules compliance report, annual reports of analyzed companies do not satisfy those criteria and voluntary disclosure level is low. On the other hand, Public Disclosure Platform is the best resource for corporate governance and other information related to those companies. General corporate governance structure of the listed hospitality companies is comprehensible, but still they should spend much more effort in order to improve corporate governance mechanisms. The originality of the study lies in the fact that it considers a subject that is frequently neglected by tourism researchers in Turkey. Noteworthy contribution of this study is to offer a policy to hospitality companies to improve their corporate governance mechanisms.