NCEO Annual Conference Judged "Best Ever"

The NCEO's annual conference from April 17 to 19 was said to be the "best ever" by a number of attendees. The conference featured a new format designed to reduce the number of speakers on panels and increase the ratio of company attendees to consultants. Next year's annual meeting will be in Chicago in April.

Keynote speaker Margaret Blair of the Brookings Institution told the participants that corporations need to find ways to account for and compensate the "firm-specific human capital" that is increasingly the basis for a company's competitive position. Current ownership models are based entirely on financial and physical capital, ignoring the tremendous investment companies have in training and retaining their employees. Blair argued that the owners of this human capital -- the employees -- have traditionally been paid for it in higher wages, with increasing pay for the same job categories going to more senior people. As companies are finding it difficult to pay these wages in competitive markets, they are laying off people, with an emphasis on encouraging departures of the most senior (highest paid people). Ultimately, Blair argues, this undermines the firm and the economy. Instead, she suggested, firms should pay people for their human capital the way they pay other owners, namely in stock.

Blair's recent book, Ownership and Control, has stimulated considerable discussion in economic and government circles, although she said she was more likely to be asked to discuss her ideas than to get feedback that they would be implemented.