Not all successful management consultants are whores at heart - but it helps. Consultants who survive and prosper learn early on that very little repeat business comes to those who find compensation levels in client companies too high. Indeed these people can provide you with the latest and most subtle ways of making certain that executive compensation levels are not needlessly influenced by such extraneous factors as how well the owners of the business are faring. Even though your aggregate annual amount is gratifying, of course, one must never rely on just one form of incentive compensation. If you are so unfortunate or ill-advised as to be caught in such a trap, consultants can show you a variety of escape routes. Certainly one of the most defensible of all compensation devices is the stock option plan. It couples gain to the executive with gain to the shareholder - and what shareholder can ask for more than that! Stock option plans worked well - or at least selectively well when mild inflation was the rule. However, when rampant inflation took over, company after company was able to report record revenues and profits. But the stock market is not altogether stupid. Unfathomable, yes; but not stupid. It recognized that record earnings were being reported in dollars of lesser value, and so, alas, share prices did not respond. Most option plans were under water. This was a dreadful situa- tion crying out for a creative solution, and management consultants rose to the challenge. They conceived a miracle called "performance unit plans." These had the obvious advantage of disassociating