Company: WTFCN
Filing Date: 2025-04-03
Form Type: DEF 14A
Source: 0001104659-25-031671
Chunk: 52

Company: WINTRUST FINANCIAL CORP
Filing Date: 2025-04-03
Form: DEF 14A
Chunk 52
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 above target payouts should be achievable only with above target, superior organizational performance. Further, the use of total shareholder return as a long-term incentive metric is intended to directly link NEO and shareholder interests. • Compensation levels should be competitive to enable us to attract and retain a highly qualified management team to lead and grow our Company. The successful operation of our Company requires an experienced and talented management team. We hire for both the current and anticipated future needs of the organization, so executives must be able to effectively lead the organization now and also meet future needs of a growing organization. To do this, our compensation program must be competitive with those of our peer firms to attract and retain talent that is capable of scaling for the future. • Compensation opportunities should be commensurate with an executive’s roles and responsibilities. Our organization values talented executives who perform comprehensively, both within their specific roles as well as taking on more leadership responsibilities. Consequently, our compensation program seeks to recognize and reward our executives who are most responsible for the performance of the Company and who engage in broader duties than their job titles may imply. • Compensation for NEOs should be fair and perceived as such, both internally and externally. We measure the appropriateness of our compensation offerings by comparing them both internally and externally to peer group benchmarks. Shareholders are best served when we can attract and retain talented executives with compensation packages that are competitive with organizations similar in size, scope and complexity to Wintrust. 37

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Peer Group Benchmarking On an annual basis, the Committee’s independent compensation consultant, Meridian Compensation Partners, LLC (“Meridian”), provides the Committee with assessments of the competitive market and best practices relating to executive compensation practices, including peer group development, executive and board benchmarking, executive pay-for-performance analysis, research on regulatory and industry trends, and overall program design. The Committee utilizes these assessments and references when considering compensation program design and other decisions. Peer Group Analysis On an annual basis, the Committee engages Meridian to review the peer group to evaluate whether it reflects the appropriate population of banks both regionally and nationally similar to Wintrust in size, scope and complexity. When identifying and constructing the competitive peer group, the Committee took into consideration which companies compete for customers, executive talent or investors, as well as other factors including the amount of commercial and industrial loans, level of non-interest revenue, and comparability in business models. These factors were considered as the Committee sought to develop a peer group that approximated the size and the structure of the Company. The following peer group