Douglas Baker Jr. Ecolab Inc.

Chairman, CEO

Total compensation: $25,315,464 for the year ended Dec. 31, 2016

Salary: $1,187,500

Nonequity incentive pay: $1,699,100

Other compensation: $193,386

Exercised stock options: $18,350,338

Value realized on vesting shares: $3,885,140

New stock options: 188,679

Total 2016 shareholder return: 3.8 percent

Note: Baker has been CEO of St. Paul-based Ecolab since July 2004. Much of Baker's realized compensation comes from the value of previously issued long-term equity awards that vests or he exercises. Last year, he realized $22.2 million from those equity awards, on par with the prior year.

Baker's overall compensation increased 6.5 percent from the previous year. The increase came from the $1.7 million cash incentive bonus earned in 2016 for meeting financial goals, after not earning a bonus in 2015.

Ecolab's financial performance in 2016 was good for 98 percent payout of the targeted financial performance for the year. But management recommended to the board that the payouts be reduced to 95 percent in order to fund bonuses for employees not in the plan. Only about 5 percent of Ecolab's more than 47,500 employees are in the management incentive program. The top managers have elected to spread the bonuses in the past. In 2016, the program funded hundreds of individual awards that ranged up to several thousand dollars.

Patrick Kennedy