Senior managers can be rewarded as much for their contribution to organisational failure as for their contribution to organisational success. Discuss.

The issue of executive remuneration has continued to be the most headline grabbing corporate governance issue dominating the 2003 AGM season. In the past couple of years the media has recounted countless stories of senior directors walking away from companies with huge compensatory payoffs. Such high-profile cases have fed a growing mood of public disgust and shareholder disdain, and this has led in turn to many calling for substantial action to be taken. The way that …

…with growing concerns over issues of governance being bandied about perhaps severance deals will eventually become more regulated. Who knows for sure? One thing that is for certain is that the issue of perception is all-pervading here. One man's success is another man's failure, and the dividing line is purely subjective. How performance is judged, rewarded, condemned or congratulated is simply in the eye of the beholder(s); and that for certain will never change.