Impact of Senior Management Remuneration on the Financial Performance of South African State-Owned Enterprises

The purpose of this paper is to analyse whether senior management remuneration enhances financial performance and is contingent on the financial performance in South African state-owned enterprises. A quantitative approach was adopted with secondary data collected from a sample of 21 enterprises and primary survey data from 126 senior managers. The ordinal regression analysis of primary data shows a significant negative effect of senior management remuneration on financial performance with z-statistic values greater than 2. The binary logistic regression of secondary data shows that, firstly, senior management remuneration has no significant effect on the financial performance of state enterprises at p-values greater than 10%. Secondly, financial performance is positive and statistically significant at the 1%, 5%, and 10% significance levels, showing that all financial performance indicators have a positive impact on senior management bonuses. Hence, senior management remuneration is contingent on the financial performance of state-owned entities.