IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecl/stabus/1756.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Leading Indicator Variables, Performance Measurement and Long-Term versus Short-Term Contracts

Author

Listed:
  • Dutta, Sunil

    (U of California, Berkeley)

  • Reichelstein, Stefan J.

    (Stanford U)

Abstract

This paper develops a multiperiod agency model to study the use of leading indicator variables in managerial performance measures. In addition to the familiar moral hazard problem, the principal faces the task of motivating a manager to undertake "soft" investments. These investments are not directly contractible, but the principal can instead rely on leading indicator variables which provide a noisy forecast of the investment returns to be received in future periods. Our analysis relates the role of leading indicator variables to the duration of the manager's incentive contract. With short-term contracts, leading indicator variables are essential in mitigating a hold up problem resulting from the fact that investments are sunk at the end of the first period. With long-term contracts, leading indicator variables will be valuable if the manager's compensation schemes are not stationary over time. The leading indicator variables then become an instrument for matching the future investment return with the current investment expenditure. We identify conditions under which the optimal long-term contract induces larger investments and less reliance on the leading indicator variables in comparison to short-term contracts. Under certain conditions, though, the principal does better with sequence of one-period contracts than with a long-term contract.

Suggested Citation

  • Dutta, Sunil & Reichelstein, Stefan J., 2002. "Leading Indicator Variables, Performance Measurement and Long-Term versus Short-Term Contracts," Research Papers 1756, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecl:stabus:1756
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://gsbapps.stanford.edu/researchpapers/library/RP1756.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fudenberg, Drew & Holmstrom, Bengt & Milgrom, Paul, 1990. "Short-term contracts and long-term agency relationships," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 1-31, June.
    2. Ittner, CD & Larcker, DF, 1998. "Are nonfinancial measures leading indicators of financial performance? An analysis of customer satisfaction," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36, pages 1-35.
    3. Paul, Jonathan M, 1992. "On the Efficiency of Stock-Based Compensation," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(3), pages 471-502.
    4. Chiappori, Pierre-Andre & Macho, Ines & Rey, Patrick & Salanie, Bernard, 1994. "Repeated moral hazard: The role of memory, commitment, and the access to credit markets," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(8), pages 1527-1553, October.
    5. Reichelstein, S, 2000. "Providing managerial incentives: Cash flows versus accrual accounting," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 243-269.
    6. HOLMSTROM, Bengt, 1979. "Moral hazard and observability," LIDAM Reprints CORE 379, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    7. Banker, Rd & Datar, Sm, 1989. "Sensitivity, Precision, And Linear Aggregation Of Signals For Performance Evaluation," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(1), pages 21-39.
    8. Srikant Datar & Susan Cohen Kulp & Richard A. Lambert, 2001. "Balancing Performance Measures," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(1), pages 75-92, June.
    9. John R. Hauser & Duncan I. Simester & Birger Wernerfelt, 1994. "Customer Satisfaction Incentives," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 13(4), pages 327-350.
    10. Dirk Sliwka, 2002. "On the Use of Nonfinancial Performance Measures in Management Compensation," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(3), pages 487-511, September.
    11. Kim, Oliver & Suh, Yoon, 1993. "Incentive efficiency of compensation based on accounting and market performance," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1-3), pages 25-53, April.
    12. Fudenberg, Drew & Tirole, Jean, 1990. "Moral Hazard and Renegotiation in Agency Contracts," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 58(6), pages 1279-1319, November.
    13. Jensen, Michael C & Murphy, Kevin J, 1990. "Performance Pay and Top-Management Incentives," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(2), pages 225-264, April.
    14. Lambert, Richard A., 2001. "Contracting theory and accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 3-87, December.
    15. Bebchuk, Lucian Arye & Fried, Jesse M. & Walker, David I., 2001. "Executive Compensation in America: Optimal Contracting or Extraction of Rents?," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt1x24r7st, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    16. Bebchuk, Lucian Arye & Fried, Jesse & Walker, David I, 2001. "Executive Compensation in America: Optimal Contracting or Extraction of Rents," CEPR Discussion Papers 3112, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Bengt Holmstrom, 1979. "Moral Hazard and Observability," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 74-91, Spring.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Christensen, Peter O. & Feltham, Gerald A. & Sabac, Florin, 2003. "Dynamic incentives and responsibility accounting: a comment," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 423-436, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sunil Dutta & Stefan Reichelstein, 2003. "Leading Indicator Variables, Performance Measurement, and Long‐Term Versus Short‐Term Contracts," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(5), pages 837-866, December.
    2. Park, Sohee, 2023. "Customer prospects and pay-performance sensitivity: Evidence from Korea," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    3. Lambert, Richard A., 2001. "Contracting theory and accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 3-87, December.
    4. Shane Dikolli & Igor Vaysman, 2006. "Contracting on the Stock Price and Forward-Looking Performance Measures," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(4), pages 445-464.
    5. Jens Robert Schöndube, 2007. "Early versus late effort in dynamic agencies with learning about productivity," FEMM Working Papers 07026, Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Faculty of Economics and Management.
    6. Bushman, Robert M. & Smith, Abbie J., 2001. "Financial accounting information and corporate governance," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 237-333, December.
    7. Dutta, Sunil & Reichelstein, Stefan J., 2004. "Stock Price, Earnings and Book Value in Managerial Performance Measures," Research Papers 1873, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    8. Armstrong, Christopher S. & Guay, Wayne R. & Weber, Joseph P., 2010. "The role of information and financial reporting in corporate governance and debt contracting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2-3), pages 179-234, December.
    9. van Veen-Dirks, Paula, 2010. "Different uses of performance measures: The evaluation versus reward of production managers," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 141-164, February.
    10. Kroos, P., 2009. "The incentive effects of performance measures and target setting," Other publications TiSEM 944001f9-198b-4b81-8824-3, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    11. de Aguiar, Andson Braga & Pinheiro, Paulo Natal & Oyadomari, José Carlos Tiomatsu, 2014. "How do different performance measures affect managerial time orientation? Empirical evidence from sales managers in the oil and gas industry," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 143-153.
    12. Michael J. Petersen, 2007. "Using Downstream Revenue in a Performance Measurement System," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 24(4), pages 1193-1215, December.
    13. Engel, Ellen & Hayes, Rachel M. & Wang, Xue, 2003. "CEO turnover and properties of accounting information," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(1-3), pages 197-226, December.
    14. de Meza, David & Webb, David C., 2003. "Principal agent problems under loss aversion: an application to executive stock options," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 24676, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    15. Sabac, Florin, 2008. "Dynamic incentives and retirement," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 172-200, September.
    16. Margaret A. Abernethy & Jan Bouwens & Laurence Van Lent, 2013. "The Role of Performance Measures in the Intertemporal Decisions of Business Unit Managers," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(3), pages 925-961, September.
    17. Dirk Jenter & Fadi Kanaan, 2015. "CEO Turnover and Relative Performance Evaluation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(5), pages 2155-2184, October.
    18. Dhinu Srinivasan & Alex Thevaranjan, 2016. "The role of non-financial measures in controlling myopic activities: the case of hard selling," International Journal of Accounting, Auditing and Performance Evaluation, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 12(2), pages 103-130.
    19. Voulgaris, Georgios & Stathopoulos, Konstantinos & Walker, Martin, 2014. "IFRS and the Use of Accounting-Based Performance Measures in Executive Pay," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 479-514.
    20. Florin c{S}abac, 2007. "Dynamic Agency with Renegotiation and Managerial Tenure," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(5), pages 849-864, May.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecl:stabus:1756. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/gsstaus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.