The Bonus Dilemma
Jon Jacobs
INTRODUCTION
As bonus time looms, the financial services industry around the world faces an unprecedented situation of government financial participation and intense political scrutiny. Both 2008 compensation and the pay paradigm for future years are being reshaped under this spotlight.
This White Paper focuses on public relations aspects of the dilemma confronting U.S. investment banks over reformulating compensation – both near-term and long-term, from the C-suite to the operations staff. Due to recent and ongoing injections of taxpayer funds, decisions that traditionally aimed to balance employee retention needs with budgetary constraints must now also weigh the interests of a daunting array of
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However, the Swiss bank said that for most of its employees,
"the current system of variable compensation will basically not change." (5)
CURRENT YEAR 'S BONUS CALCULUS
The political spotlight on compensation poses both near-term and longer-term risks to financial institutions. An obvious near-term risk is an institution reining in year-end incentives more severely than its peers might lose talent to competitors early in 2009. Any perceived inequities that arise between similarly positioned firms are a potential trigger for defections. Even hobbled banks and hedge funds will seize opportunities to scoop up top talent that 's disaffected with their current employer.
Thus, even more than usual, recruitment staff should spend this period seeking real-time information about what their closest counterparts are doing in terms of year-end incentives. Internal recruiters can provide valuable intelligence to divisional and department heads and other compensation decision-makers.
Besides risking defections in the near term, an institution perceived as letting public officials dictate its compensation procedures runs a risk of gradually metamorphosing into something like a government agency itself. In public agencies, salaries often are set by published charts rather than managers ' discretion, and bonuses don 't exist. To the
The bank at some point received negative attention for issuing credit to arms companies, including companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Textron, Colbun, BAE Systems and EADS. Some companies within the bank’s portfolio have also been involved in environmental and labor rights violations scandals, for instance Wal-Mart and Total USA. This negative attention may lead to loss of investor confidence in the bank.
In the case presented both AFLAC and L.L. Bean had their own distinctive ways of utilizing their products in order to enhance the total compensation for its employees. The factor that has deterred more employees away from their current employer is that of benefit packages, and reward systems. As stated by () “compensation affects a person economically, sociologically, and psychologically. For this reason, mishandling compensation issues is likely to have a strong negative impact on employees and, ultimately, on the firm’s performance” (p.313). Many felt just a bump in pay wasn’t enough to substantiate their hard work or the efforts that the performance efforts provided to their organization. As stated by () “the right total rewards system a blend of monetary and non-monetary
carefully planned out and considered, the total closure or failure of the organization could be at hand in the near future. In our modern age, employers know that salary is not the only factor that should be considered and that salary alone will not lead to better or more highly profitable workers alone. This is why compensation planning is important and why pay should have some connection between performance and compensation. This is why the human resources department should consider many monetary and non-monetary factors when considering how to properly compensate and motivate employees (Dessler, 2013).
I appreciate that the banking sector is vital to the strong health and growth of our nation’s economy and directly affects each of us, however, many of these financial institutions took the funds and immediately paid out senior executive bonuses instead of using the money to back loans to the public. These executive bonuses were public record and created a massive outcry from the taxpayers, but even this seemingly greedy use of power was overlooked by the federal and state governments.
Q1 – What was up with Wall Street? The Goldman Standard and Shades of Gray.
Purpose: In Weeks 3 and 5, you submitted information to help you in completing the final project. Feedback was provided to assist you in maximizing points earned on this final paper. To properly complete this final project, you must include the feedback provided to apply to this final paper. The purpose of this assignment is to apply your critical thinking skills in completing the employee process from job analysis to compensation based on performance. You are now going to
The intent of this assignment is to develop a user-friendly tool that may be applied in the workplace to document Compensation processes and to guide a practitioner in completing the critical steps of each process. The purpose of this assignment is to assist in describing each component of a compensation management system, to develop a practitioner's guide for several of the key compensation management tasks covered in HR511 Total Rewards.
Please summarise a recent event or development relating to local, regional or global activity that impacts our Investment Banking business. (150 words) *
The second compensation package was not well designed nor did it help define what the corporate strategy would be. For a second time the compensation package focused on maximizing shareholder’s wealth and didn’t take into consideration the stakeholder’s position at all. Dunlap’s package was deeply weighted in company options ($3.75M). In fact it was weighted heavier than before. The stock grants were
It is not surprising that the most prevalent changes observed were to incentive plans. Traditionally, the conventional incentive plan structure links pay levels to performance
Extensive research has determined that the banking industry is in an unstable state. The industry’s profits have
Even though employee retention starts with attracting potential employees, today’s society has placed a new and greater demand for skilled and educated employees as new hires for their companies. These employees, however, are starting to become harder and harder to find. So
The topic I chose to research and discuss is the topic of recruiting and retaining the best employees. I chose this subject because I felt it was important for an employer trying to compete in this very competitive business environment, no matter what the business is, to be able not only hire the best and most qualified employees but retain them and keep them motivated. The ability to distinguish the difference between high performing employees and lower performing employees can be detrimental to a company’s success or failure. In retrospect, this goes back to recruiting and retaining the best employees while avoiding and being able to let go of those of a weaker caliber. Before an organization can thrive in recruitment and retention,
Some organizations are unwilling to show their reward systems and pay policies (Lawler, 1995). Many Human Resources professionals believe gender pay gaps to be resolvable through the monitoring of pay levels and communication (Report on Salary Surveys).Greater pay transparency has been a great benefit to the board, employees and managers as they now know what is happening across the business and they are able to confidently justify their actions (Commission Policy Report).All market-related supplements are recorded and reviewed separately from basic salary to ensure openness and transparency. Regular research market rates within the various labor markets in which they operate is undertaken improving transparency would also help to improve talent development, as employees would be able to see what they could earn if they wanted to move to another division and upgrade their skill set. (Commission Policy Report).
1. Assess proposals to institute pay for performance in federal agencies. What are the consequences of adopting new labor–management procedures at a time when the United States is deeply involved with homeland security and other national security concerns?