AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson gets executive pay of $32 million for 2019

Have you ever wondered how much money tech industry CEOs and other executives are making? Usually, the top position in a corporation benefits from a base salary and additional pay, including incentives, insurances, along with financial and non-financial rewards and stock award value, and the overall pay depends on how good a company is doing.

A recent publication by The Wall Street Journal leads us to the conclusion that AT&T was doing pretty well in 2019. AT&T’s CEO, Randall L Stephenson, has received a compensation of $32 million despite last year’s criticism of AT&T’s management by shareholders, which boosted the company’s share value, rather than diminish it.

For those who don’t know, the company received disapproval from the investor Eliott Management, which was unhappy, to say the least, with some management decisions and strategies, as well as the sudden departure of AT&T’s telecom division chief, John Donovan.

The aforementioned disagreement ended in a truce with a promise for future improvement of AT&T’s policies and expectations of it to become a shareholder-friendly company and to grow into a more profitable and focused business. In consequence, the company’s stock value rose and AT&T’s CEO’s overall compensation increased by 10% in 2019.



John Stankey, COO of AT&T and CEO of WarnerMedia, received $22.5 million in 2019, which is a substantial growth from his 2018 compensation of $16.6 million. For him and other company executives, the rewards they get from stock shares are reportedly bigger than their annual fixed salary.

Meanwhile, the ex-chief of the company’s telecom division, John Donovan, received $27 million in 2019, including a bonus for retirement. He, rather suddenly, left the carrier in August, which contributed to the mentioned above critique by Eliott Management.