Firm Performance in the Hospitality Industry: Do CEO Attributes and Compensation Matter?

Past research has shown mixed results regarding the role CEO compensation plays in influencing firm financial performance in the hospitality industry. To explore this relationship further, we concomitantly examine the role of compensation and CEO attributes like education, age, tenure, functional background, and gender on firm financial performance. Our analyses are based on secondary and hand-collected data from a large and comprehensive sample of U.S. publicly traded hospitality firms. The results from panel data analyses show that CEO cash compensation is positively related to return on assets, while equity compensation is unrelated to firm performance. We further find that when CEO compensation and attributes are jointly examined, CEO compensation has a relatively lower impact on firm performance than CEO attributes do. The results imply that the hospitality industry may want to reconsider its compensation practices in order to better align the interests of managers and shareholders and motivate managers to maximize firm value