By bringing cofounder Aneel Bhusri back to the CEO job, Workday has turned to a classic Silicon Valley tradition to deal with the AI threat squeezing software company stocks: the return of the founder.
Bhusri’s return to the top job at the human resources software company reflects the belief that only a founder with billions on the line and a personal legacy at stake has the unique vision and authority to steer the ship through difficult waters. And with majority voting control plus operational authority as CEO, Bhusri will have more power to make any difficult changes he sees necessary. A close look at Bhusri’s compensation package, however, suggests that it’s also an acknowledgement of just how bleak the investor prognosis is for software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies.
To lure Bhusri back to the CEO job he left two years ago, Workday is giving him a $138.8 million pay package comprising cash and performance-based and restricted stock. More than half the package, $75 million, only pays out if Bhusri can hit a series of undisclosed stock price targets over the next five years. Perhaps more telling is the other half: Roughly $60 million in restricted stock requires only that Bhusri stick around at Workday for the next four years, with no performance targets whatsoever.
