Practice Areas & Industries: Baker & Hostetler LLP

Practice/Industry Group Overview

Executive Compensation: Helping Clients Reach Goals

We advise and represent clients in all types of executive compensation matters. Understanding that executive compensation is effective only when it furthers the client's strategic objectives, we have helped clients reach their goals in a wide array of situations, including the following:

• The public company that perennially seeks to attract and retain key people to serve as directors, officers and key managers.
• The public company that regularly needs to rotate its key managers among an array of subsidiaries and affiliates, including some situated in foreign countries.
• The privately held company that sought to separate selected key employees from employment, during an ownership transition, without driving them into the arms of a competitor and impairing the company's enterprise value.
• The Internet company that needed to rebuff attempts by a former executive to exercise his stock options.
• The privately held company that needed to offset built-up deferred compensation owed to a departing executive against amounts owed to the company by the executive.
• The tax-exempt institution that sought to retain its executive director because of his unique fund-raising abilities.
• The privately held real estate development company that needed to strategically reposition itself to sell services rather than rent real estate.
• Public and private companies that sought to preserve the enterprise value of their respective businesses during periods of organizational disruption (which have included bankruptcies, and industry wide consolidations) by using employment agreements and long-term equity incentives to "lock up" selected management team members.
• The professional services company that needed to reinforce its collaborative culture through the use of project-based profit-sharing pools controlled by those who participated in the project.
• Public company executives who needed to preserve built-up contract and stock rights, to comply with company-based stock ownership requirements, which were threatened by divorcing spouses.
• Private business owners who found themselves compelled to restructure their businesses in order to monetize the interests of a divorcing spouse without undermining the business's viability or forcing a sale.
• Executives solicited to join other organizations, but unsure of their obligations to their present employers under existing employment covenants.

The list continues to grow.

We use a collaborative approach which matches up our clients' needs with the experience needed to attain their varying goals and objectives. To do so, our executive compensation team reaches out to an array of attorneys whose practices are concentrated in fields such as federal and state income and employment taxation; employment and employment litigation; employee benefits; federal and state securities regulation; intellectual property; domestic relations; private wealth planning; and creditors' rights/bankruptcy. Through this process, we orchestrate solutions to complex -- and widely varying -- client challenges.

About Baker Hostetler

Baker Hostetler lawyers help clients establish, maintain and protect market-leading positions across the United States and around the world. We offer clients the strength of 600+ lawyers in a full range of practices, a unique geographic platform including both coasts and the center of the country, a deep knowledge of industry issues and a 90-year track record of excellence and achievement.

For more information about our Executive Compensation Practice:

National Contacts

John J. McGowan
216.861.7475
jmcgowan@bakerlaw.com

William M. Toomajian
216.861.7569
wtoomajian@bakerlaw.com

Cincinnati

William Appleton
513.929.3403
wappleton@bakerlaw.com

Cleveland

Raymond M. Malone
216.861.7879
rmalone@bakerlaw.com

Ruth Ann Maloney
216.861.7576
rmaloney@bakerlaw.com

John J. McGowan
216.861.7475
jmcgowan@bakerlaw.com

William M. Toomajian
216.861.7569
wtoomajian@bakerlaw.com

Columbus

Georgeann G. Peters
614.462.4769
gpeters@bakerlaw.com

Costa Mesa

George T. Mooradian
714.966.8800
gmooradian@bakerlaw.com

Denver

David L. Starbuck
303.764.4107
dstarbuck@bakerlaw.com

Houston

Lisa H. Pennington
713.646.1303
lpennington@bakerlaw.com

Los Angeles

John F. Cermak
310.442.8885
jcermak@bakerlaw.com

New York

Elizabeth A. Smith
212.589.4277
esmith@bakerlaw.com

Orlando

G. Thomas Ball
407.649.4004
tball@bakelaw.com

Washington, DC

David J. Fischer
202.861.1712
dfischer@bakerlaw.com