IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/stratm/v36y2015i7p1082-1092.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Throwing caution to the wind: The effect of CEO stock option pay on the incidence of product safety problems

Author

Listed:
  • Adam J. Wowak
  • Michael J. Mannor
  • Kaitlin D. Wowak

Abstract

type="main" xml:id="smj2277-abs-0001"> Stock options are thought to align the interests of CEOs and shareholders, but scholars have shown that options sometimes lead to outcomes that run counter to what they are meant to achieve. Building on this research, we argue that options promote a lack of caution in CEOs that manifests in a higher incidence of product safety problems. We also posit that this relationship varies across CEOs, and that the effect of options will depend upon CEO characteristics such as tenure and founder status. Analyzing product recall data for a large sample of FDA-regulated companies, we find support for our theory . Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Suggested Citation

  • Adam J. Wowak & Michael J. Mannor & Kaitlin D. Wowak, 2015. "Throwing caution to the wind: The effect of CEO stock option pay on the incidence of product safety problems," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(7), pages 1082-1092, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:stratm:v:36:y:2015:i:7:p:1082-1092
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1002/smj.2277
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brian J. Hall & Jeffrey B. Liebman, 1998. "Are CEOs Really Paid Like Bureaucrats?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 113(3), pages 653-691.
    2. Danny Miller, 1991. "Stale in the Saddle: CEO Tenure and the Match Between Organization and Environment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(1), pages 34-52, January.
    3. Jared Harris & Philip Bromiley, 2007. "Incentives to Cheat: The Influence of Executive Compensation and Firm Performance on Financial Misrepresentation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 18(3), pages 350-367, June.
    4. Sriram Thirumalai & Kingshuk K. Sinha, 2011. "Product Recalls in the Medical Device Industry: An Empirical Exploration of the Sources and Financial Consequences," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(2), pages 376-392, February.
    5. Theresa S. Cho & Donald C. Hambrick, 2006. "Attention as the Mediator Between Top Management Team Characteristics and Strategic Change: The Case of Airline Deregulation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(4), pages 453-469, August.
    6. Camelia M. Kuhnen & Alexandra Niessen, 2012. "Public Opinion and Executive Compensation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(7), pages 1249-1272, July.
    7. David Souder & Philip Bromiley, 2012. "Explaining temporal orientation: Evidence from the durability of firms' capital investments," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(5), pages 550-569, May.
    8. Berger, Philip G & Ofek, Eli & Yermack, David L, 1997. "Managerial Entrenchment and Capital Structure Decisions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1411-1438, September.
    9. William F. Sharpe, 1964. "Capital Asset Prices: A Theory Of Market Equilibrium Under Conditions Of Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 19(3), pages 425-442, September.
    10. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    11. Lin Peng & Ailsa Röell, 2008. "Executive pay and shareholder litigation," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 12(1), pages 141-184.
    12. Mooweon Rhee, 2009. "Does Reputation Contribute to Reducing Organizational Errors? A Learning Approach," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(4), pages 676-703, June.
    13. Edward I. Altman, 1968. "Financial Ratios, Discriminant Analysis And The Prediction Of Corporate Bankruptcy," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 23(4), pages 589-609, September.
    14. Edward I. Altman, 1968. "The Prediction Of Corporate Bankruptcy: A Discriminant Analysis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 23(1), pages 193-194, March.
    15. Pamela R. Haunschild & Mooweon Rhee, 2004. "The Role of Volition in Organizational Learning: The Case of Automotive Product Recalls," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(11), pages 1545-1560, November.
    16. Axel v. Werder, 2011. "Corporate Governance and Stakeholder Opportunism," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 22(5), pages 1345-1358, October.
    17. Rajgopal, Shivaram & Shevlin, Terry, 2002. "Empirical evidence on the relation between stock option compensation and risk taking," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 145-171, June.
    18. Krishna Palepu, 1985. "Diversification strategy, profit performance and the entropy measure," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(3), pages 239-255, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Coles, Jeffrey L. & Daniel, Naveen D. & Naveen, Lalitha, 2006. "Managerial incentives and risk-taking," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(2), pages 431-468, February.
    2. Kevin Mayo & George Ball & Alex Mills, 2022. "CEO Tenure and Recall Risk Management in the Consumer Products Industry," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 31(2), pages 743-763, February.
    3. Lars Helge Hass & Monika Tarsalewska & Feng Zhan, 2016. "Equity Incentives and Corporate Fraud in China," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 138(4), pages 723-742, November.
    4. Jeongil Seo & Daniel L. Gamache & Cynthia E. Devers & Mason A. Carpenter, 2015. "The role of CEO relative standing in acquisition behavior and CEO pay," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(12), pages 1877-1894, December.
    5. Mónica López-Puertas Lamy, 2012. "How does Ownership Structure Influence Bank Risk? Analyzing the Role of Managerial Incentives," Working Papers 1208, Departament Empresa, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, revised Nov 2012.
    6. Nie, George Y., 2024. "The Missing Dimension of Risk: Evidence from Inside Debt Maturity and Acquisition Choices," SocArXiv jd3c2, Center for Open Science.
    7. Ling Xue & Gautam Ray & Xia Zhao, 2017. "Managerial Incentives and IT Strategic Posture," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 180-198, March.
    8. Souad Chaieb, 2021. "The Impact of Cash Holding on Debt Cost," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 11(6), pages 75-93.
    9. Robert M. Bushman & Christopher D. Williams & Regina Wittenberg‐Moerman, 2017. "The Informational Role of the Media in Private Lending," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 55(1), pages 115-152, March.
    10. Muurling, Rutger & Lehnert, Thorsten, 2004. "Option-based compensation: a survey," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 365-401.
    11. Anantharaman, Divya & Lee, Yong Gyu, 2014. "Managerial risk taking incentives and corporate pension policy," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(2), pages 328-351.
    12. Bulan, Laarni & Sanyal, Paroma & Yan, Zhipeng, 2010. "A few bad apples: An analysis of CEO performance pay and firm productivity," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 62(4), pages 273-306, July.
    13. Chengru Hu & Wei Jiang, 2019. "Managerial risk incentives and accounting conservatism," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 52(3), pages 781-813, April.
    14. Hong-Yi Chen & Cheng Few Lee & Tzu Tai, 2020. "The Joint Determinants of Capital Structure and Stock Rate of Return: A LISREL Model Approach," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Cheng Few Lee & John C Lee (ed.), HANDBOOK OF FINANCIAL ECONOMETRICS, MATHEMATICS, STATISTICS, AND MACHINE LEARNING, chapter 35, pages 1345-1397, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    15. Nilakshi Borah & Hui Liang James & Jung Chul Park, 2020. "Does CEO inside debt compensation benefit both shareholders and debtholders?," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 54(1), pages 159-203, January.
    16. Jongwon Park & Sunyoung Kim & Albert Tsang, 2023. "CEO Personal Hedging and Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 182(1), pages 199-221, January.
    17. Jeong-Bon Kim & Li Li & Mary L. Z. Ma & Frank M. Song, 2013. "CEO Option Compensation, Risk-Taking Incentives, and Systemic Risk in the Banking Industry," Working Papers 182013, Hong Kong Institute for Monetary Research.
    18. Burak Güner, A. & Malmendier, Ulrike & Tate, Geoffrey, 2008. "Financial expertise of directors," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 323-354, May.
    19. Frerich Buchholz & Kerstin Lopatta & Karen Maas, 2020. "The Deliberate Engagement of Narcissistic CEOs in Earnings Management," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 167(4), pages 663-686, December.
    20. Câmara, António & Popova, Ivilina & Simkins, Betty, 2012. "A comparative study of the probability of default for global financial firms," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 717-732.

    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:bla:stratm:v:36:y:2015:i:7:p:1082-1092. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/0143-2095 .

    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.