Staples CEO declined pay raise

Courtesy of Staples Inc.

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Ronald L. Sargent, chairman and CEO of Staples Inc., has chosen not to accept his 2.5 percent base salary raise for 2014, Staples said in a statement Wednesday. The raise had previously been cleared by the company’s board.

The raise would have been $ 31,230, based on his base salary of nearly $1.25 million in 2013, Dow Jones Business News reported.

The Framingham-based office-supply retailer also said that Paul-Henri Ferrand has been nominated to its Board of Directors. Ferrand, vice president of U.S. Sales and Operations at Google, was nominated at the company’s 2015 annual meeting.

“Paul-Henri is a strong strategic fit given his deep background in e-commerce and technology at large, global organizations. His extensive business-to-business experience will be extremely valuable as we continue to focus on our delivery businesses as a key growth engine of Staples,” Vijay Vishwanath, chairman of the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee, said in the statement.

Another development from the annual meeting is that Lead Independent Director Robert C. Nakasone announced his decision to retire at the end of his term.

Sargent said in the statement: “Bob Nakasone has been a strong leader and has made significant contributions to Staples over many years.”

Nakasone will be replaced by Robert E. Sulentic, CEO of CBRE Inc. and a Staples board member since 2007.

In another change, the Board of Directors plans to appoint an independent chair upon the succession of the current chairman. That is in response to feedback from shareholders, the company statement said.