Syzygy Consulting Group

yzygy Consulting Group provides expertise in human resources management, practices and programs. We specialize in total compensation design and development, including executive pay, incentive pay, stock compensation, high technology pay, sales commission plans and custom market surveys.

Coming Attractions
Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act

The financial reform bill, titled the “Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act,” will soon be in force for all public companies. This Act is also likely to set the tone for the compensation practices of late-stage private companies. Informally known as the Dodd-Frank Bill, the Act requires a company to describe and defend eight broad compensation-related areas. (Continued...)

Emerging Compensation Trends

2009 Pre-IPO and Private Company Total Compensation Survey

NOW AVAILABLE
Most Comprehensive Survey of Cash and Stock Compensation at the Lowest Price

Syzygy’s Pre-IPO and Private Company Total Compensation Survey, conducted annually since 1999, is recognized nationally as the premier source of private company compensation data. The completed survey compiles pay practice data on 45,700 employees at 341 private companies. Key findings include:

Median CEO total cash compensation decreased 11 percent and CFO total cash compensation declined 19 percent from the prior year.
Average base salaries decreased by six percent year-over-year.
Median bonus for a Director of Engineering fell from $12,683 to $4,311, a decrease of 66 percent, and the median bonus for a Senior Development Engineer fell from $12,020 to $4,178, a decrease of 65 percent from the prior year.
CEO stock option holding also declined by nine percent. Most of the decrease in executive ownership is the result of dilution from new investments and lower compensatory grants to tenured CEOs and CFOs.
A CEO-founder generally receives 27 percent less cash compensation than a non-founder CEO, which is offset by compensatory stock holdings that are 2.5 times greater than their non-founder counterpart.
401(k) matches, employee paid-time off, severance benefits and paid holidays were unchanged, with some companies actually increasing the amount they contribute to 401(k) plans.
Private companies absorbed more of the increase in employer sponsored health care costs, but there was a median increase of eight percent in the amount employees contribute to cover premiums.
Private companies will increase bonuses in 2010 and have also budgeted for more new hires.
Compensation for independent Board members increased 25 percent.

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syz · y · gy (siz'i je) n., pl. -gies. 1. Astron. a. The nearly straight-line configuration of three celestial bodies (as the sun, moon and earth during a solar or lunar eclipse) in a gravitational system. b. The alignment of three or more points in space. 2. Any two related things, either alike or opposite. [< LL syzygia < Gk syzygia union, pair, equiv. to syzyg(os): yoked together (sy- SY- +zyg-, root of zeugnynai to yoke, + -os adj. suffix) + -ia -Y]

Syzygy Consulting Group LLC