Microsoft trims MVP benefits, allows shareholders say on executives' pay
Summary: Microsoft is trimming some of the benefits it is offering to participants in its Most Valuable Professional (MVP) program.It's also introducing a say-for-pay provision to its shareholders.
Instead of trying (and failing) to do full blog posts on the many different Microsoft news bits I've read recently, I decided to do a quick link list. Here are a few new items that might be of interest:
Microsoft is trimming some of the benefits it is offering to participants in its Most Valuable Professional (MVP) program, no doubt due to cost-cutting measures affecting the company overall. In a note to MVPs (posted on the ActiveWin.com site), Microsoft claims to be "expanding our investment in the MVP Award Program" with a new online MVP portal coming next year. But in the same note, officials acknowledge that they are cutting a number of the "less significant" benefits, as of October 1, including Company Store (MVP Bucks), E-Academy, E-Reference Library and MS Press Book Reviews. The worldwide MVP conference is not cancelled; it's on for mid-February 2010 (but in Redmond/Bellevue, not in Seattle).
Microsoft is allowing shareholders to have a formal say about its executives' compensation. In Microsoft's case, the "say on pay" input will be collected once every three years. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer just got a 4 percent raise for fiscal 2009, by the way (not counting bonuses). Microsoft is one of a growing list of public companies adopting the say-for-pay provision. The first nonbinding vote on executive compensation happens in conjunction with this year's shareholders' meeting on November 19. Microsoft Windows President Steven Sinofsky is slated to release a book later this year, co-authored with Harvard management professor Marco Iansiti that will offer insights into how to make a large organization not just survive, but thrive. The book will be published by John Wiley & Sons. Think of it a detailed analysis of Microsoft's Windows client unit -- which Sinofsky reorganized and pruned in order to get Windows 7 done in a timely way and to create the groundwork for future Windows releases. (TechFlash's Todd Bishop found a Barnes & Noble listing for the forthcoming title, -- tentatively named "One Strategy!" and due November 28.
Microsoft has made available another piece of its Azure cloud platform puzzle: The Azure management API. The API is meant for developers who need to deploy and manage the compute and storage components of the Windows Azure operating system. The Azure management API is REST-based and will allow developers to code against in their toolset of choice to manage their services.
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Talkback
MVP Perks
When do you think the US economy will recover?
MVP For 6 Years
Sure the removal of the "Microsoft Bucks" is sad, BUT the major gift we receive is the free 12 month subscription to MSDN and TechNet. That has NOT been removed from the MVP program and is still a perk for us going foward.
Marc Liron MVP
but for to be a MVP you must spend..
If bankers say capping their salaries hurts their desire to work,
What purpose do MVPs serve?
If this is simply a self-congratulatory thing, it would seem to be something easily cut out.
Your question is incorrect
Similarly, most of the MVPs worth knowing have indicated that the benefits do not change their behaviours that made them eligible to be MVPs. They help people because there are people who need help.
So no, it's not "simply a self-congratulatory thing".
Asking "what purpose do MVPs serve?" implies that they are assigned to a purpose. This is incorrect - MVPs are recognised for having served. It is an award in recognition of past behaviour, not as payment for future acts.
MVPs are:
We Are Important
As MVP's we serve the online (and offline)communities that we have the MVP award in. For instance the last 6 years I have supported Windows XP (and later Vista users) in online forums and via my popular support websites and Windows newsletter.
I do this for free becuase I believe in the software!
Regards
Marc Liron MVP
For me, it's helping
Just like teaching (I was a physics grad student at U of Md), there's no greater feeling than when you get an "I understand!!" or "Thanks! That was it!" reply...
That's why *I* do it....
Hank Arnold (MVP)
Wrong....
This award is a way for MS (and the on-line community) to recognize (and reward) folks who spend a lot of time trying to help folks dela with a very complicated and frustrating environment . As others have said (and will say), loss of come of the perks is painful, but it's damned nice to be able to put the award certificates on my office wall and be able to put (MVP) after my sig.
Say-on-pay dangerous
Shareholders are motivated by their ROI. This is often a short-term thing. Connect these two points, and you could see executives being incented to make short-term decisions that are actually bad in the long term. As if they didn't have enough incentive to do that already, now we're adding more to it.
I think a better idea is to have a long-term, structured compensation plan similar to what pro athletes have. For example, the structure could include basic compensation, then have add-ons for long term goals like five years of sustained double-digit growth.
That's better than tying exec compensation to share price.
RE: Microsoft trims MVP benefits, allows shareholders say on executives' pay