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Issues as to the suitability of executive compensation packages have obtained an ever increasing profile in recent years. Whilst there has been quite extensive empirical investigation of pay-performance sensitivity, the framework of performance-pay has received less attention in the literature and examination to date. Besides this - whilst there has been a quantum of investigation of relationships between compensation and performance, there has been less focus on case study based analysis. In this context, the current study makes a twofold contribution to the examination of executive directors’ remuneration in FTSE 350 companies. First, this research aims to empirically investigate linkages between the nature and amount of compensation packages and company performance with a particular focus on examining the extent of interrelationships between pay and performance over a ten year period from 1999 to 2008. Within the scope of a variety of theoretical perspectives, this deductive study puts a focus on addressing the question of whether managerial compensation is the greater influence on firm performance or whether it is the latter which has the greater influence on the former. Second, this study seeks to qualitatively add to the relevant literature by means of a longitudinal case study of remuneration at UK based major multi-national company, BP, over a ten year period from 2001 till 2010. Within the context of a variety of theoretical and institutional perspectives, this inductive study explores, by means of investigation of BP’s Directors Remuneration Reports, the role of the BP remuneration committee in setting the mechanisms and structures which determine the nature and extent of executive remuneration packages at BP and considers the wider generalisability of the findings therefrom. Overall the current study utilises a mixed methods approach via a combination both quantitative and qualitative modes of analysis – an approach which is relatively rare in the discipline of research into corporate governance and related issues. The outcomes from the empirical work show evidence of the presence of dual positive associations between executive compensation and company performance. However, the results do indicate that executive compensation is more influential in its effect on firm performance than the framework of performance-related pay. This finding is interpreted as lending support to the stewardship and/or tournament theories as to underlying drivers of executive remuneration in comparison with agency theory, represented by agent-principal or managerial hegemony perspectives, as an explanatory of the construction of executive remuneration and the link with firm performance. Similar to prior literature, the empirical findings indicate that equity-based compensation is more robust in the linkage with firm performance than cash pay dominated packages. However, the results showed that the existence of remuneration committees in general reveals insignificant and negatively related to total CEO/executive remuneration. This finding highlights therefore the need to put a focus on the actual role of compensation committee in setting the type and extent of executive pay packages in a large UK company. The outcomes from the archival case study also suggest that it is difficult to find significant support for a pure agency theory approach whereby shareholders seek to align their interests directly with those of their managers as a driver of executive compensation packages. There is more evidence suggestive of a managerial power/hegemony perspective which is heavily mediated by the presence of powerful non-executive directors and the institutional presence of the remuneration committee. Perhaps the most significant aspects to emerge from the case study are the importance of personal relationships and power at boardroom level. Beyond this the inferences of the supplementary content analysis conducted specifically on the Directors Remuneration Reports are suggestive of a focus on overall BP performance rather than on the specific activities and achievements of individual executive directors. In conclusion, the findings of the present study provide a wealth of detail both quantitative and qualitative as to the manner in which executive remuneration has been set in the UK in recent years and as to linkages both with corporate performance and underlying theories of the determinants of executive remuneration. As such it sheds light on an area of importance and one of continued private and public concern and may be of interest to those responsible for governance within firms and to wider public and regulatory interest as well as future researchers in the field.

After the Great Recession of 2007 there was a spotlight on executive compensation. The magnitude and structure of executive pay became an area of concern to the public. As a result, company management across all sectors had to find a way to offer competitive compensation plans that aligned the interest of shareholders with that of executives. The outcome was an increased focus on tying executive pay to company performance. The level of fixed-pay incorporated into target compensation began to decreases rapidly and was replaced by “at-risk” compensation. For some, this was a major achievement in the world of executive compensation, however, others view this change as potentially dangerous. I chose to analyze the pay-mix structure and annual incentive plans of a group of bellwether companies to see if this transition is increasing company’s exposure to fraud. In this essay I attempt to tie increases in at-risk pay to increases in fraud risk, while identifying incentive goals affected by common fraud practices.

Flexible compensation is a new concept in wage and salary administration which permits the employee to select from the various benefits, and cash, a plan tailored to meet his own needs, limited only by his total compensation and those statutory provisions pertaining to his wages. Within recent years, compensation practitioners have been urged in professional journals to adopt flexible compensation as a way to improve their compensation programs in order to attract, hold, and motivate employees. The purpose of this study is twofold. First, the results of this research will provide empirical data on the current status of flexible compensation for nonexempt employees in the United States. Second, the research will contribute toward the development of a set of comprehensive guidelines for implementing flexible compensation programs.

This study examines the effects of research and development (R&D) reporting method and managerial knowledge of supervisor compensation on R&D project continuation decisions. The current study employs an experiment with a 2x3 between-participants design, manipulating both R&D reporting method (expense vs. capitalize) and knowledge of supervisor compensation (control group with no knowledge vs. knowledge of non-restricted stock compensation vs. knowledge of restricted stock compensation). Using salient short-term incentives to motivate real earnings management, this study demonstrates that capitalization may result in managers foregoing economically efficient R&D investment opportunities. The results indicate that managerial knowledge of supervisor compensation structure has little influence on managers’ R&D project continuation choices. However, when managers capitalizing R&D expenditures had knowledge that their supervisors received non-restricted (short-term) stock compensation their perceived personal responsibility for the decision significantly decreased. Participants who capitalized R&D expenditures and had knowledge that their supervisor received restricted (long-term) stock compensation rated the importance of making a decision to please their supervisor significantly higher than all other participants. Additionally, participants with knowledge that their supervisors restricted stock compensation were significantly more concerned about the likelihood of negative personal repercussions regardless of R&D reporting method. These findings contribute to the management accounting literature by providing new insights on the influence of knowledge of supervisor compensation on managerial decision making as well as additional insights into the factors that contribute to and limit real earnings management. This study also extends the literature on R&D by providing evidence of the potential for real earnings management when R&D expenditures are capitalized in the absence of personal responsibility.

Redundancy payment and other forms of compensation in employment relations The diploma thesis deals with forms of compensation in employment relations in contemporary Czech labour law. Aside from the Introduction and Conclusion, the thesis consists of four chapters. The second chapter discusses the concept of compensations in labour law, and provides an analysis of the functions of labour law compensations, from the perspective of both the employee and employer. An overview of the different types of compensations is provided, including their categorization. Redundancy payment, the primary and most frequent type of labour law compensation in Czech law, forms the content of chapter three. The functions of redundancy payments are explained, and the terms and conditions which give rise to the right of employees to redundancy payment are analyzed. Further, the amounts of redundancy payments under different circumstances are dealt with in detail, including an explanation of the methods of their calculation; the author also focuses on the category of average monthly remuneration and its importance in this relation. Each of the manners of employment termination and their relevance for the right to redundancy payment are discussed, as well as the amounts of redundancy payments pertaining to each type of...

This master's degree thesis refers to legal regulation of the compensation of damage under civil law. The main purpose of my thesis is to analyze and evaluate current Czech legal regulation of the compensation of damage in civil law. The interpretation is based on regulation in the Civil Code, namely Act no. 40/1964. Coll., as amended, whereas deviations arising from commercial and employment compensation regulation are omitted. The paper offers an overview of the opinions of the leading legal experts on fundamental issues of compensation. The interpretation includes analysis of relevant decision-making practice of courts and a comparison with the legislation in projects of European tort law. The thesis also contains an overview of the most significant changes brought by the forthcoming new Civil Code, in case it is adopted. The thesis is composed of nine chapters, each of them dealing with different aspects of the matter. The first chapter is introductory. It is followed by the second chapter named "General characteristics of liability for damage" which includes definition of legal liability, outline of historical development of the legislation in our country, its current and future forms and functions of compensation. Chapter Three focuses on the analysis of general assumptions of the liability, including...

Subject of this master's degree thesis is to delineate basic aspects of legal provisions connected with compensation of damage under Civil law. Main legal document, which regulates compensation of damage in the Czech Republic is Act no. 40/1964, as amended. This Act provides the basic elements of compensation, which include the general conditions of liability, method of compensation, the individual types of damage, etc. This master's degree thesis is dedicated mainly to the compensation of damage, whereas general and special liability is neglected, because it does not relate directly to the assigned topic. This master's degree thesis is divided into three main chapters. The first chapter of this master's degree thesis deals with basic institutes of compensation of damage in general. It includes description of basic function, subjects, lapse and court's moderation right all related to compensation of damage in general. The second chapter deals with basic assumptions of liability for damage such as illegal act or law qualified event causing damage, damage, causation and fault as well as circumstances excluding illegality, kinds of damages or main conditions related to the fault. The third chapter, from my point of view the most important, deals with compensation of damage and in this part is distinguished...

The aim of the present diploma thesis entitled "The Legal Regulation of Expropriation" is to provide a coherent but not really comprehensive survey of the present legal regulation of the possibility of forced deprivation or limitation of property rights or the right corresponding to easement of land and structure. The thesis consists of nine chapters. Chapter One deals with the institute of property right as one of fundamental human rights, the existence of which is indispensable for the expropriation. Chapter Two is focused on the concept of expropriation: the definition of its basic elements, and its distinction from some other similar concepts. Chapter Three gives a brief survey of core legal regulations referring to the problem of expropriation. Further on, specific prerequisites for the expropriation are stated on the basis of the above regulations, beginning with the analysis of the object of expropriation (Chapter Four), through the statutory conditions as they are given in Chapter Five, to individual specific purposes of the expropriation (Chapter Six). In its final parts, the thesis focuses especially on the specifics of the expropriation procedural regulations (Chapter Seven). Chapter Eight is concerned with specific procedures. The conclusion brings in the conditions that may lead to the...

In essay one, my primary objective is to see the sensitivity of foreign exchange rate risk on firm performance in US manufacturing industry and examine if the hedging help reduce the foreign exchange rate risk. I am particularly interested in manufacturing industry because of the nature of business operation of manufacturing firms. Manufacturing firms in US are not only exposed to foreign exchange fluctuation from sales and revenue but also are exposed to foreign exchange rate risk for procurement, placement and investment. I find that the firms with extreme foreign exchange rate risk exposure exhibit lower daily return and firms with very low foreign exchange rate risk exhibit higher daily return using the portfolio approach. I also find that the firms that hedge has lower foreign exchange rate exposure compared to firms that don’t hedge. The coefficient for hedge is negative and statistically significant. In essay two, I investigate the effect of executive compensation on exchange rate risk in US manufacturing industry. There is a large theoretical and empirical interest on executive compensation using agency framework that investigates the conflict of interest between shareholders and corporate executives. That interest has been largely aligned with the use of managerial performance dependent on observable measures of firm performance. Since US manufacturing firm is largely exposed to foreign exchange transactions by design, I investigate if the value of in-the-money unexercised vested executive stock option has any impact on foreign exchange rate exposure. I investigate if the value of in-the-money unexercised unvested executive stock option has any impact on executive stock option. Using pooled OLS, fixed effect panel data and random effect panel data, I find that in all 3 model value of in-the-money unexercised vested executive stock option has negative coefficient and is statistically significant. At the same time in all 3 models the value of in-the-money unexercised unvested executive stock option is positive and is statistically significant.