{"id":306887,"date":"2010-02-11T10:48:58","date_gmt":"2010-02-11T15:48:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.footnoted.org\/?p=4530"},"modified":"2010-02-11T10:48:58","modified_gmt":"2010-02-11T15:48:58","slug":"cincinnati-bell%e2%80%99s-magical-compensation-lamp%e2%80%a6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/306887","title":{"rendered":"Cincinnati Bell\u2019s magical compensation lamp\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Employment agreements are, no doubt, the result of serious negotiations between a company, an employee, and a gaggle of attorneys and staff from Human Resources.<\/p>\n

The filing that caught our attention this time concerns an 8-K<\/a> that Cincinnati Bell, Inc.<\/a> (CBB) filed earlier this week.\u00a0 But before we disclose what popped out of the magical compensation lamp, here\u2019s a little background on the relationship between the company and its top executive.<\/p>\n

According to this proxy<\/a> filed in March, 2009,\u00a0John F. Cassidy has served as Cincinnati Bell’s president\/CEO since July, 2003. \u00a0He became a director in 2002, but he has actually been with various divisions of the company since 1997.<\/p>\n

Cassidy\u2019s most recent Amended and Restated Employment Agreement is dated January 1, 2009.\u00a0 (You\u2019ll find it as an attachment<\/a> to the 10-K,\u00a0filed February 27, 2009.)\u00a0 It provides for some nice terms:\u00a0 Besides the usual benefits, he gets an annual base salary of $645,000, a \u201cBonus target\u2026 of not less than $968,000\u2026\u201d, and the promise that at least once a year he\u2019ll get a review \u201c\u2026and be considered for Base Salary and\/or Bonus target increases.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s not mentioned anywhere in past filings \u2013 until Monday \u2013 was any reference to a retention bonus.<\/p>\n

Then \u2013 poof!\u00a0 Suddenly, on February 5, 2010, a new subsection is added to the 2009 Employment Agreement which states that the company is giving Cassidy a $2.1 million retention bonus \u2013 and it’s giving it to him that same day.\u00a0 The 8-K states that \u201cThe amendment was approved by the Company\u2019s Board of Directors to reward Mr. Cassidy\u2019s performance and encourage his long-term employment with the Company.\u201d<\/p>\n

The most curious thing isn\u2019t that the company wants to reward a long-tenured employee. \u00a0It\u2019s that the agreement and the payment of the bonus occurred so suddenly \u2013 and seemingly out of thin air. Perhaps there was another job offer that Cassidy was considering, though you’d never know it from the filings.<\/p>\n

There’s also the not-too-minor fact that Cincinnati Bell’s stock performance<\/a> hasn’t exactly been retention-bonus worthy under Cassidy’s tenure as CEO, falling nearly 60% since he took the company’s helm which raises the question of why it’s so important to retain him.<\/p>\n

Image source: \u00a0Magic Lamp Dance Studio<\/em><\/p>\n

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Employment agreements are, no doubt, the result of serious negotiations between a company, an employee, and a gaggle of attorneys and staff from Human Resources. The filing that caught our attention this time concerns an 8-K that Cincinnati Bell, Inc. (CBB) filed earlier this week.\u00a0 But before we disclose what popped out of the magical […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4072,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-306887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4072"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306887\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}