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Witnessing a Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) annual shareholder meeting is not to be taken lightly. The four-hour meeting was more like an entertainment venue and circus more than anything, and in between the festivities, the chairman of the board and other executives slipped in the proposed shareholder proposals for consideration by the proxy holders in attendance. This year's meeting featured 13 proposals, with 11 of those being submitted by smaller and much larger institutional shareholders.In the midst of covering this, it was amazing to see that 6 of the 11 shareholder-submitted proposals featured the theme of limiting executive and/or board compensation or executive/worker pay equity proposals. In other words, some shareholders want workers to be paid more and executives less, even though these executive pay packages are generally based on peer group measurements -- or so the board of the world's largest retailer would have you think.
Now, to be fair, almost every public company rates the performance and compensation of the C-level folks within a certain peer group, which is a flawed but followed strategy since it can easily set things up for overcompensation. Moving on, the single largest shareholder proposal that garnered my attention last week at the meeting was one that would require board members to have a stake in Wal-Mart (to the tune of $5 million minimum), instead of the "good-old-boy network" that was being proposed (using the term "flunkies" I might add). I liked this one since board members who have a financial stake in the company they are governing would be more likely to really try to get those fiduciary duties right.
In conclusion, I'm not sure of the point of Wal-Mart's lavish showmanship (Jennifer Lopez and Jordin Sparks performed) at the retailer's annual shareholder meeting (beyond showcasing associates in every possible light), but since all 11 shareholder proposals were defeated and the business portion was so small, everything witnessed -- especially J Lo -- was sure worth it. I think.
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