– Broc Romanek

This Davis Polk memo does a nice job of summarizing the pay ratio disclosures so far…

Also see this Bloomberg article entitled “Less Is More for Companies Reporting CEO-to-Worker Pay Gap”…

– Broc Romanek

I’ve been running an executive pay conference for over 15 years now – and I’ve always been loathe to program about “pay-for-performance” because I don’t quite understand it. I’ve always been a hard worker – so I’m the type who gives “my all” in exchange for a salary. That’s all the incentive I really need.

But I certainly can be dis-incentivized. And if that happens, my reaction is to find a new job. And the memo that the United Airlines CEO recently sent to employees – described in this article – would fall into the category of things that dis-incentivized me.

First, there is the tone of the memo – aptly described in the article as tone-deaf. And then there is the subject of the memo: taking away quarterly performance bonuses from many employees (who expected them in the regular course as they hit certain benchmarks) – and instead pooling together that money to give much larger bonuses to those that win a lottery of the bonus money. To capture the essence of that, I’ll use this excerpt from the article:

It’s a curious logic, one that says: “How do we get them to improve? How about taking away their bonus?” To be followed by “heh. heh. heh.”

Can you imagine what the United CEO would say if his compensation was subject to a random drawing. I guess we’ll never know because employee backlash already led to the company shelving this horrible idea…

– Broc Romanek

As noted in the summary provided in this Torys memo, Ontario has joined the UK (see these memos) in trying to tackle gender pay equity:

On March 6, Ontario introduced “Then Now Next: Ontario’s Strategy for Women’s Economic Empowerment,” which includes a proposed “pay transparency” bill. The strategy sets out a three-year plan to increase gender equity, and makes recommendations for removing the gender wage gap in the province. If passed, the legislation—which is not currently publicly available—will have significant implications for employers in Ontario, and Ontario will become the first province in Canada to legislate pay transparency.

– Broc Romanek

We have posted the transcript for the recent webcast: “The Top Compensation Consultants Speak.”

– Broc Romanek

In his blog on this site, Mark Borges is providing full analysis of pay ratio disclosures as they come in – and this Andrews Kurth memo does a nice job of summarizing the disclosures so far…

– Broc Romanek

Dig this updated “Compensation Committee Handbook” from Skadden Arps. Written in a style that is easily understood & 110 pages long…