Our inaugural symposium topic is the use of human capital metrics in executive compensation. A working group of representatives from academia, consulting, and publicly traded U.S. companies, convened in November 2023 to tackle three interrelated questions:

Is there evidence that human capital investments provide a positive return to corporations?

How is the impact of those investments most effectively measured?

Should such metrics be factored in the executive performance and incentive determination processes? If so, how?

This report presents findings on human capital metrics of different types and their prevalence in public disclosures as well as trends in the use of human capital metrics in executive compensation. We outline recommendations and guidance for developing and monitoring human capital metrics. We provide a framework for deciding whether these metrics should be embedded in executive incentive plans. We offer a new approach to incentive design that is grounded in behavioral economics theory and research with the caveat that our recommendations were not unanimously endorsed by the working group and it was agreed that they are not universally applicable.