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Just a quick update that on April 8, 2020, Institutional Shareholder Services (“ISS“) published policy guidance reflecting certain adjustments due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.  The guidance addresses how ISS’s benchmark and voting policies may be applied in this new area of uncertainty.  In many cases, the guidance merely reiterates that…

Join us on April 9, 2020 from 10:00 am to 11:00 am Central for our FREE monthly webinar on “Executive Compensation Considerations in Light of Market Volatility, Stock Prices and the Unknown,” where we will discuss compensatory issues to consider as a result of failed (or failing) performance-based compensation metrics and lost value to the…

Many publicly-traded issuers in today’s environment have outstanding equity awards with performance goals that are unlikely to be achieved.  In response, Compensation Committees of such issuers will need to strike a balance between incentivizing/retaining executives and dealing with the stark reality that shareholders have lost substantial value.  To that end, Compensation Committees are likely to…

Compensation governance is a front-and-center topic with a continued focus on stock ownership and clawback policies (in part due to the voting guidelines of institutional investors, proxy advisory firms and the Dodd-Frank Act).  At 10:00 am Central on Thursday, October 10, 2019, in a webinar entitled “Stock Ownership Policies & Clawback Policies: Design Pointers,” our…

Keeping with this evening’s Halloween spirit, members of Board of Directors and Compensation Committees should be aware of an allegation that is currently floating within the ominous fog – that some executives of publicly-traded issuers are trick-or-treating with “ghost revenue.”  Kidding aside, the allegation (or potential allegation) is that some executive officers are using ghost revenue (i.e., deferred revenue) in order to satisfy otherwise unattainable non-GAAP performance metrics.  A grossly-oversimplified explanation of this issue is addressed in the below portions of this post.
Continue Reading Compensation Governance: Is Ghost Revenue Real?

To help preserve the business judgment rule defense and make it more difficult for a plaintiff to prove that a director breached his or her fiduciary duties, Compensation Committee members should use tally sheets (a.k.a., “placemats”) when making compensatory decisions and attach such tally sheets to the Committee’s resolutions or minutes. 
Continue Reading Tally Sheets: A Reminder To Compensation Committees