Knowledge Center
Issue 17 : Performance Issue
Raymond J. Milchovich
Raymond J. Milchovich currently serves on
the Board of Directors of the Dow Chemical
Company. He also serves on the board of NTS,
the world’s largest independent provider of
environmental simulation testing, and is the
Lead Director of the Nucor Corporation board.
Raymond was Chairman, President, and CEO
of Foster Wheeler AG from 2001 to 2007, and
continued working for the company as Chairman
and CEO until 2010. From 2010 to 2011, he
served as a non-executive Chairman and
consultant for Foster Wheeler.
In his time at Foster Wheeler, Raymond
led the company through an out-of-court
restructuring of the balance sheet by convincing
the company’s creditors to support a series of
equity for debt exchanges while maintaining a
modest level of value for the existing equity. In
2005, which was the first year after completion
of the restructuring, Foster Wheeler achieved
$62 million of adjusted net income. In 2006 through
2008, the company achieved three consecutive
years of record earnings, which peaked in 2008
at $533 million of adjusted net income.
Raymond Milchovich: Once
an agreement was reached
between Dow and Third Point,
to Dow’s credit, they ran a
very professional governance
process. They put forth a slate
of new directors and brought
them onto the board as they
would have in any other
circumstance.
"Management should be able to credibly engage and satisfy most, if not all, shareholder needs."
Milchovich: : I think a newly elected director has the responsibility to come
down the learning curve as rapidly as possible and to do so, you can’t be shy.
I have found it very beneficial to do extensive reading and then to meet with
members of management to get acquainted and to gain an understanding of
the business, how it operates, and strategically what management is trying to
accomplish. It is a must to meet with other members of the board to benefit
from their experience and to gain their perspective.
Milchovich: One of my guiding principles is that the board must be a highly
functional independent governing body and that management must run the
company. Management should be able to credibly engage and satisfy most, if
not all, shareholder needs. However, in today’s governance world, there can
be a role for directors with shareholders, but I believe that must be carefully
coordinated with management.
Milchovich: The first thing I would do is listen and ask questions to learn as
much as possible about the shareholder needs. Second, I would discuss my
perception of the shareholder need with management. Finally, I would collaborate
with management and expect to develop a plan of action to address the
shareholder need.
Milchovich: On January 1, 2015,
my relationship with Third Point
changed because my tenure as a
Dow director began and as such I am
legally obligated to behave consistent
with a very specific set of disclosure
requirements. Dow, Third Point, and I thoroughly
understand this.
Milchovich: I haven’t seen a business yet that
doesn’t have some form of cyclicality that it
must be managed. When I hear people talk about
the new normal, sometimes I chuckle because
I’ve never seen a business situation that didn’t
present us with some level
of surprise. We must
plan, however, any good
business plan includes
scenario planning. We
have to do that so that we
don’t overextend ourselves
and get into trouble
because we acted on the
wrong scenario.
Milchovich: For example, the oil business has been a boom/bust business for as long as I can remember, and I
think it’s probably likely that it’s going to continue that way. At Foster Wheeler, we served that industry. We looked at our
business plans, and we always did scenario planning with the most-likely case, the upside case, and a downside case. Thinking
about those cases impacted the choices we made.
Milchovich: : I think the best you can do is pick a set of metrics that compare
against the most representative peer group. That’s what we’ve always tried
to do. It’s what we try to do in the businesses that I’m involved with today. It’s
an imperfect science, but in my view, it needs to be done.
Milchovich: When we are setting compensation structure for management,
we must always keep in mind how shareholders are likely to be doing at
various points in the business cycle. If management is doing well in terms
of compensation and shareholders aren’t in terms of returns regardless of
the reasons, my experience would suggest that we are asking for trouble.
Milchovich: When I think back over all
my board experience, the relative quality
of all board members has always been
known and understood. If the situation
is such that the performance of one or
more directors needs to be addressed, then
that needs to be dealt with candidly and
respectfully with the annual evaluations,
direct counseling from the lead director,
or some other process that the full board thinks is appropriate. Boards must
have the willingness to deal with performance.
"Our duty is to become an excellent governing body and doing so is not always comfortable or easy."
Milchovich: Directors today must have a strong work ethic, very sound
judgment, and courage. To expand on the characteristic of courage, directors
must be willing to ask the difficult questions, the courage to say no when it
may not be easy to do so, and courage to challenge management when it may
be awkward to do so. Our duty is to become an excellent governing body and
doing so is not always comfortable or easy.
Milchovich: Today this issue is getting a tremendous amount of attention
in terms of governance and I don’t happen to agree with the focus. In my
opinion, the focus needs to be on behavior much more than structure. In
other words, I have seen both structures work very well and not work so well
because of the behavior of the Chairman, the CEO, the Lead Director, and/or
the other board members.
Milchovich: In the situation at Nucor today,
we have a combined CEO/chair role. We have
an outstanding chairman and CEO in John
Ferriola. John behaves exactly the way shareholders
would want to see him behave, and
I believe that I’m behaving as lead director
exactly the way a lead director should behave.
What it comes down to is behavior more than
structure. I think you can have separate roles,
but if you have a different chairman than the
CEO and the behavior of the chairman and CEO
is not what it needs to be, you’ll still not have
the kind of governance that you want.
Milchovich: I believe that we are experiencing tremendous change in the public company governance environment
today mainly if not exclusively due to the dramatic increase in shareholder activism. While I think this has created a high
degree of anxiety in many board rooms and while I’m sure some situations can be questioned in terms of the long-term value that
is being created, I think the aggregate impact is positive in terms of “raising the bar” regarding performance standards. In my
view, the only way to establish and maintain autonomy is to perform and that is where our focus should be.