According to the San Francisco Chronicle of September 9th, in the Daily Digest, Alan Mulally, the incoming new CEO of Ford, will be paid:
- An annual salary of $2 million.
- A signing bonus of $7.5 million.
- $11 million to offset the compensation he is giving up by leaving Boeing.
- $10.5 million in stock options.
- $11 million if Ford changes control or lets him go for any reason other than “cause” before 2011.
What promises do you suppose this man is really making to the stockholders, to the customers, to the citizens of Detroit, Michigan, and the United States? That he will “try harder”? That he will turn around the situation that has been brewing at Ford for 40 or 50 years? Impossible. No single human being, from outside the company, can fulfill such a promise. If no promise of that sort is being made, then what crazy habits have we arrived at for compensating senior executives in this country? What kind of a world are we making in which business executives are paid like rock stars and world-class athletes, to “play” in games where the play of the game is private, and success is measured the way it is in a modern business like Ford.
What is the board of Ford doing? Cutting 30,000 jobs, closing 14 plants, and investing $30 million in the dream that Mr. Mulally will leap tall buildings in a single bound?
© Copyright 2006, Chauncey Bell and BABDI, LLC. All rights reserved worldwide.