We examine the relationship between investment in different corporate social domains, corporate governance and firm performance. We demonstrate that policies with respect to different corporate social performance domains are related differently to financial performance. Our results indicate that proactive policies with respect to employees and diversity are the policies most strongly related to firm’s financial performance. In addition, we show that simultaneous employee and environment policies help firms further improve their financial performance We also reveal that certain corporate social policies can reduce the negative impact of anti-takeover protection measures and chairman duality. These results are important since they imply that corporate governance and social performance cannot be studied in isolation.