Them Apples and Liking Them

[Jeff Bone]

Jeff Bone wrote:

> > If and when you show yourself knowledgeable about the subject, I'd be happy
> > to discuss it further.

One last bit.  While I certainly feel no obligation to respond to this --- the
conversation hereabouts, as it always does, rests on its own merits, which are often
iffy ;-) --- let me point out that my own professional community closely intersects
his:  I've pitched to Michael, met with him on other occasions, met -w- his brother
Adam in his capacity as an analyst and as a potential investor, interacted with
various of his board members / advisors, took a recommendation from one of his own
mentors on hiring an outside compensation consultancy at one of my previous ventures,
etc.  I've also put together corporate by-laws, constructed and executed many option
plans, hired executives, set compensation policies, defined and managed cap structure
evolution, and interacted with corporate legal counsel on the kinds of issues we're
talking about continuously for most of the last decade in my capacity as an
entrepreneur and indeed over the last 3 years as an outside director or advisor to
other concerns.  The stuff you write about?  I do it daily, have for years.

I'm no Michael fan, by the way.  The 8 months I spent at Dell in the early 90s were
in many ways the worst 8 months of my professional life.  I often believe that Dell
succeeded *despite* himself by being in the right place at the right time with a
simple yet powerful idea.  On a personal level, yes, I think he's probably
overcompensated relative to the actual value he adds to the company he started.
OTOH, I'm humble enough to realize that this is a personal opinion, and that clearly
Dell-the-company's performance --- whether or not it is due to his input --- is
sufficient to trump any concerns over Dell-the-exective's compensation among the
majority of his shareholders.  It certainly hasn't stopped me from owning Dell on
occasion.  (Indeed I wish I'd hung onto my own low strike price options from '92 or
so, their value would've trumped the benefit I got from the sale of Activerse.
Coulda, woulda, shoulda...  ;-)

My purpose in this conversation is not defending Michael's / his shareholder's
choices in how to compensate Michael.  Rather I'm defending the notion that there is
no "right / wrong," "appropriate / inappropriate," etc. --- no standard template for
compensation which allows for such value judgements.  Each executive compensation
decision is a negotiation between the executive and his shareholders;  the market
sets the price and, as always, the market is definitionally infallible.

$0.02,

jb