October 9, 2009
BofA’s Elusive Walk-Away Number: The Case for Better Disclosure
– Broc Romanek, CompensationStandards.com
In his “Proxy Disclosure” Blog, Mark Borges has already blogged three times about the challenges of determining how much money recently “resigned” CEO Ken Lewis will walk away with from Bank of America. As Marked noted in his first blog: “All it took was one hour, two college degrees, and over 20 years’ experience in the executive compensation area to come up with this “ball park” figure. Does anyone still think that we don’t need a “walk-away” number as part of the executive compensation disclosure?”
We have been touting the need for better transparency in the severance and change-in-control contexts for quite some time – pushing the need for companies to disclose their “walk-away numbers.” This is not even about responsible pay practices – this is squarely in the hands of lawyers who draft for a living. This is about better transparency. It’s time for you to make a difference.
Those of you attending our upcoming “4th Annual Proxy Disclosure Conference” – either in San Francisco or by video webcast – will not only receive practical guidance about how to craft such a disclosure, you will also get a pro-forma example of what this looks like…register for the Conference now.