GILLAN, STUART L.; HARTZELL, JAY C.; PARRINO, ROBERT - In: Journal of Finance 64 (2009) 4, pp. 1629-1655
We report evidence on the determinants of whether the relationship between a firm and its Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is governed by an explicit (written) or an implicit agreement. We find that fewer than half of the CEOs of S&P 500 firms have comprehensive explicit employment agreements....