Ralph E. DeJong is a partner in the law firm of McDermott Will & Emery LLP and is based in its Chicago office. He focuses his practice on the compensation, executive benefits and employee benefits of tax-exempt organizations. This includes designing and preparing deferred and incentive compensation arrangements, leading governing boards in the review and approval of executive and physician compensation arrangements, negotiating and preparing executive and physician employment agreements, and analyzing the private inurement and intermediate sanctions implications of executive and physician compensation and benefit arrangements. He serves as executive compensation counsel to the board-level compensation committees of many hospitals, health systems and other tax-exempt organizations.
In addition, Ralph practices in the full range of employee benefits issues for all types of employers, with a particular focus on analyzing and minimizing fiduciary liability of employer plan sponsors.
Ralph is a frequent speaker and author on executive/physician compensation and other executive and employee benefits issues. He has addressed national conferences of such organizations as the American Health Lawyers Association, the American Academy of Healthcare Attorneys, the National Hospital Lawyers Association, the ABA Health Law Section, the ABA National Institute on Compensation of Executives and Directors, and the Healthcare Financial Management Association. He has served as an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of Notre Dame Law School, where he taught Employee Benefits Law from 2003 through 2010. He is a member of the American Bar Association and is an officer of its Tax and Health Law Sections.
Ralph is listed as a leading attorney in health care in Illinois in Chambers USA 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011: America's Leading Lawyers for Business.
He is admitted to practice in Illinois and Michigan.
Education
- University of Notre Dame Law School, J.D. (magna cum laude), 1982
- Calvin College, B.A., 1979
