Chief Executive Magazine & VisionLink Join Forces to Co-Sponsor Important Broadcast on Pay Practices

Aug. 15, 2012 - PRLog -- Two organizations focused on helping CEOs of  private companies fuel growth will broadcast a joint webinar on September 18, 2012 entitled, “How High-Growth Companies Pay their Top Producers.” The event addresses the need that most companies have to develop rewards strategies that link pay to the value that key people produce—and to avoid pay practices that nurture a culture of entitlement.  Chief Executive Magazine, headquartered in Greenwich, CT, and The VisionLink Advisory Group, headquartered in Irvine, CA are the co-sponsors of the webinar.

“Both organizations recognize how important it is to get pay ‘right,’” offered Tom Miller, president of The VisionLink Advisory Group.  “The magazine has focused much of its research on collecting data about how private companies pay their executive level talent.  And our work centers on helping companies engineer pay programs that will reinforce the growth plans of the business.  So it’s a natural marriage of resources and insight.  Attendees will definitely come out the winners on this one.”

Registration for the event is available online at: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/576152648.  There is no charge to attend.

For many years, information from private companies on compensation practices and levels has been largely unavailable.  Now, through its private research, Chief Executive has developed reliable data on over 2,800 current CEO and senior executive positions at 1,101 companies.  “This data is like a gold mine to people needing to make compensation decisions in closely-held businesses,” Miller reinforced.

The webinar on September 18 will focus mostly on practices and strategies, and not data, according to Miller.  It will include input from the CEO of one of VisionLink’s clients and will address ways his company and others have developed an approach to pay that creates appropriate links between pay and performance.  Attendees will learn about practical ways to create world-class rewards programs that better align key people with the growth plans of the business.

“Businesses are hungry for ways to create more productivity in their people,” Miller added. “Productivity comes at the intersection of effectiveness and efficiency at all levels of the organization.  It is both ineffective and inefficient to pay people strictly through salaries and discretionary bonus plans—and therefore unproductive.  If companies want to grow, they need to align compensation with their business models and pay for the effective and efficient reinforcement of the virtuous cycles of those models.”

Miller went on to say that the study conducted by the magazine confirms that most companies are recognizing the need to apply a value-sharing strategy to compensation.  Then they need to approach that task in the most effective manner possible. Of particular concern is what kind of long-term value sharing plan makes the most sense for an organization—stock, phantom equity, stock appreciation rights (SAR), performance unit plans, profit pool or something else.

“Most companies need help navigating that decision making process,” offered Craig Rutledge, leader of VisionLink’s design implementation team.  “And they need to be able to model what a plan will look like once it’s implemented.  This broadcast will help them envision how that can be done—and that it’s not an impossible task.”

The trend towards “at risk” pay is leading companies to think more deeply about their compensation programs in general, says Miller.  They are searching for the right balance between guaranteed and incentive compensation and short-term versus long-term value sharing.  Getting this right can mean the difference between a pay strategy that fuels growth and one that diminishes it.