Do founders matter? A study of executive compensation,governance structure and firm performance

This study compares founder-CEOs and professional CEOs in newly public firms in terms of executive compensation, governance structure, and firm performance. The paper applies a series of decomposition methods to separate founders' extrinsic characteristics from their intrinsic endowments. The paper finds that founder CEOs tend to earn smaller incentive compensation and smaller total compensation than professional CEOs. Founder-managed firms are associated with higher financial performance and are more likely to survive than professional managed firms. Firms with founder-CEOs are associated with even higher financial performance when the position of CEO and chairperson of the board is combined.     

The compensation conundrum: Does the hospitality industry shortchange its employees—and itself?

A comparison of salaries paid for jobs in the hospitality industry versus those in other industries showed that the hospitality positions on average paid less for comparable positions. The only exception was that both the hospitality industry and the comparison group (N = 140) paid about the same amount for low-level jobs—probably due to minimum-wage laws. For upper-level positions, however, the comparison showed a noticeable difference between the two groups. To assess the extent to which jobs are comparable, the author compared the knowledge, skills, and abilities (or human capital) needed for each set of jobs. For jobs in the midpoint of the human-capital scale, hospitality-industry wages averaged about 85 percent of wages paid in other industries. Hospitality-industry wages fell even shorter at the top of the human-capital scale, standing at an average of 78 percent of compensation for top positions found in the sample of other industries. As a practical matter, such pay disparities encourage the best-qualified candidates to choose employment in other industries.     

What makes people choose within-domain versus across-domain compensation following a self-threat? The role of self-verification motives

ABSTRACT

Consumers who experience a psychological threat may compensate by acquiring a product that directly boosts the threatened aspect of their self-concept (i.e., within-domain compensation), or they may compensate by acquiring a product that boosts an unrelated aspect of their self-concept (i.e., across-domain compensation). The current research investigates how self-verification motives influence consumers’ preference between these two compensation strategies. In two studies, participants with a self-verification motive displayed an increased preference for within- (vs. across-) domain compensatory products following a self-threat. Underlying this effect, those with a self-verification motive reported a greater desire for products that re-confirmed the threatened domain of their self-concept.     

Do complainants appreciate overcompensation? A meta-analysis on the effect of simple compensation vs. overcompensation on post-complaint satisfaction

This paper examines the incremental effect of overcompensation as compared to simple compensation on post-complaint satisfaction. In overcompensation, consumers are entitled to a refund that is more than the purchase price, whereas in simple compensation, the refund given is equivalent to if not less than the purchase price. A meta-analysis of 17 experimental studies shows that overcompensation has a substantially lower incremental effect on post-complaint satisfaction than simple compensation. However, when distinguishing between transaction-specific satisfaction and cumulative satisfaction, the smaller effect size of overcompensation mainly holds true for transaction-specific satisfaction. For cumulative satisfaction, the effect size of overcompensation is only marginally smaller. While counter-intuitive, these results appear to have a basis in three established theoretical frameworks, namely the Weber–Fechner law, prospect theory, and the different phenomenologies of the two satisfaction constructs. Implications are discussed for marketing research as well as for complaint management. Areas for future research are also explored.