The Outlook – And Our Advice – For In-Person, VSM And Hybrid Meetings In 2022… Straight From The Frontlines

The number-one question we’re being asked as readers gear up for the 2022 Meeting Season, and as Covid cases began rising again, is “What are most companies planning to do this year?”

So far, as our sister-company, that will provide Inspectors of Election at over 500 companies of every size, shape and description is seeing - the vast majority are opting for VSMs, which seems smart to us. 

And - equally smart, we think - an unusually large number of companies are booking them extra early - to get first-dibs on their preferred dates and times - and on the VSM A-Team too, we think - and, very important to smart companies - to be sure they will have the Inspector of their choice. In our 50+ years of involvement with scheduling and staffing shareholder meetings, we have never seen so many companies book so early.

Here’s our own analysis of the “Covid-Climate” for meetings in 2022:

Companies with historically low or no meeting attendance will be mostly safe, we think, to schedule small-scale in-person meetings in mid-April through August - with no more that 25 or so attendees in total, but in a big and airy space, and with pre-registration, proof of vaccination and mandatory masking required.

Nonetheless, if it were our own meeting, we would stick to the most prudent course and go virtual only - which is what most companies are doing so far.

To date, we have been hearing that quite a few companies really miss their in-person meetings, and are still keeping options open. But we ourselves would opt for the most prudent course, rather than risk hosting a “spreader event” or having to scramble if the Covid-climate turns worse.

Note well: We have seen two cases in the past two months where the in-person option had to be abandoned on very short notice - and where it was too late to give adequate notice to retail investors. Both companies had to send staffers to the original site to meet, greet and explain to retail investors - and to collect any proxies or ballots.

So far, we’d noted only one mega-cap-company that has announced an in-person meeting - in mid-May - and in a warm climate. But they have a well-developed contingency plan to go virtual-only, just in case. And oops! Just as we were going to press, Berkshire Hathaway announced that they would hold an in-person meeting in Omaha on April 30 - drawing speculation from the NY Times reporter on how they planned to protect the health of Warren Buffett (91) and Charlie Munger (98.)  Nice news for the tens of thousands of Berkshire Hathaway meeting fans, the meeting will again be streamed “live” with details on the in-person admission provisions to come in late February or early March.

Our own bet is that Covid cases will decline as the weather warms up - and some folks are saying that we are “past the peak” now - but we are betting on an upswing right after the Labor Day holiday, and as the weather cools off again. So companies with meetings in the increasingly busy September through December period would be well advised to hold their horses for now, we say, where in-person meetings are concerned - and maybe to book your dates and times for a virtual meeting well in advance…just in case.

Another trend we have been noting is the rise in interest in having a Hybrid-Meeting. This idea has been particularly popular with smallish and newer public companies that have a real desire to reach out to - and to “engage” their brand new investors - including retail investor owners and fans. We ourselves are big fans of hybrid-meetings - in principle - but we still have concerns about the ability of most companies to pull in the required technologies - and to work on the “playbook” - and on the needed dress rehearsals to pull one off in a good way. Currently, in our experience, smaller and tech-savvy companies have a much better chance of doing so than large and mega-cap companies, where both the cast of characters involved and the number of issues to be addressed tend to be so much larger.

Please remember our warnings in the last issue that institutional investors - and shareholder proponents - and the press - will be tuning in and critiquing shareholder meetings with special care - and promising to withhold votes for some or all directors at companies next year that fail to insure adequate “engagement” and a real “dialogue” with investors.

Our best advice of all is to go to our website to review our Virtual Meeting Playbook, our sample Run of Show and our easily modified Rules of Conduct for virtual-only and hybrid meetings, which we have posted on our website - to make sure your meeting will pass muster with flying colors.