All right, good morning, and welcome to the 2020 Annual Meeting of Shareholders of Oshkosh Corporation. I'm Craig Omtvedt, Director and Chairman of the Board. We will begin with the official business of the meeting, as outlined in our proxy materials. After we adjourn the formal meeting, we will receive a brief business update from Wilson Jones, President and Chief Executive Officer. So with that, this meeting is now called to order. Joining me today are the other directors of Oshkosh Corporation, as well as the company's executive officers. I would like to ask each director to stand when introduced, but please join me in thanking each of them for their support and service as a director of Oshkosh Corporation. I'm a little ahead of myself, but we really do have a hell of a management team and board.
I think as you looked at the results in the proxy statement, you see that the strategy is working and the company's delivering. So first, we have Keith Allman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Masco Corporation. Wilson Jones, our President and Chief Executive Officer. Tyrone Jordan, who served as President and Chief Operating Officer of Dura Automotive Systems. Kimberly Metcalf-Kupres, retired Chief Marketing Officer of Johnson Controls International PLC. Stephen Newlin, former Executive Chair and Chief Executive Officer, and the current Chairman of the Board of Directors of Univar Solutions, Inc. Raymond Odierno, retired General of the U.S. Army and served as 38th Chief of Staff for the U.S. Army. Duncan Palmer, Global Chief Financial Officer of Cushman & Wakefield. Sandra Rowland, Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer of Harman International Industries.
And John Shiely, retired Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Briggs & Stratton Corporation. And lastly, while not here, I would like to recognize Leslie Kenne, retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General. Leslie has served on our board since 2010. She is retiring from the board today, and we would all like to thank her for her many years of service and contributions to Oshkosh and our board. Moving on, sitting next to me is Ignacio Cortina, Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary of the company. Also here today are Sandy Heft and Bruce Ehrenstrom of Deloitte & Touche, the company's independent public accountants. We are holding this meeting for the purposes stated in the notice of the annual meeting. So Ignacio, please introduce the formal portion of the meeting.
Thank you, Craig. This 2020 Annual Meeting of Shareholders is convened in accordance with the notice and proxy statement first distributed on December 20, 2019, to shareholders of record as of December 13. We have appointed Charles Zidek as our independent Inspector of Election for today's meeting, and he is present today. Mr. Zidek has informed me that at least 91% of the stock of Oshkosh, of record as of December 13, is represented at this meeting, either in person or by proxy. This means that a quorum is present and the legal requirements to proceed with this meeting have been met. The polls are now open and will remain open until we officially close them later in the meeting.
If you are a shareholder of record and wish to vote your shares in person, you may obtain a ballot now from the Inspector of Election table in the back of the room. If anyone is voting on the authority of a legal proxy, please note that fact on the ballot. You should give both the proxy and the ballot to the Inspector of Election. Shareholders who have already voted by proxy, including over the internet or by phone, do not need to complete a ballot.
Thank you, Ignacio. The first item of business to come before this meeting is the election of directors for terms to expire at the 2021 annual meeting. The proxy materials identify the board of director nominees and describe their backgrounds, skills, and qualifications. Ignacio, will you please read the names of the board of director nominees to be voted on by the shareholders?
The names of the board of director nominees are Keith Allman, Wilson Jones, Tyrone Jordan, Kimberly Metcalf-Kupres, Stephen Newlin, Raymond Odierno, Craig Omtvedt, Duncan Palmer, Sandra Rowland, and John Shiely.
Thank you, Ignacio. The nominations are closed. The second item of business to come before this meeting is the ratification of the appointment of Deloitte & Touche as the company's independent auditors for the fiscal year ending September thirtieth, two thousand and twenty. The third item of business to come before this meeting is the consideration of a resolution to approve, on an advisory basis, the compensation of our executive officers named on page 40 of the Proxy Statement. This completes the items to be voted on at today's meeting. The polls for voting are now closed. Ignacio, please proceed with the vote and provide a report on the results.
Thank you. Craig and I received proxies authorizing us to vote shares on the items of business for today's meeting, and we have voted these shares accordingly. Based on a preliminary tabulation from the Inspector of Elections, I can report as follows as to the items of business at today's meetings. Shareholders have elected all 10 director nominees. Shareholders have ratified the appointment of Deloitte & Touche as the company's independent auditors for fiscal year 2020, and shareholders have approved, on an advisory basis, our named executive officer compensation.... The final tally of votes certified by the Inspector of Elections will be included with the minutes of this meeting and made publicly available with the SEC in the next few days.
All right, thank you for that report. As there is no further business to come before this meeting, I declare the meeting adjourned. And now, before moving on, I'd like to thank all of our shareholders for your continued support and confidence. As stated in the proxy statement, and as part of our board's succession planning effort, we are transitioning the role of Chairman of the Board to Steve Newlin. I will continue to serve as a director and assist in that transition. And I've got to say, it's been an honor. I almost get emotional, saying what an honor it's been to serve as the chairman of this company. I mean, we really do have a great company. We've got a people-first culture. We've got a phenomenally strong management team.
We've got a great board, and I will tell you, we believe we've got the strategy and the focus to continue to deliver results. So Steve, all the best as you kind of take over your new responsibilities. And now, Ignacio has a brief comment before we move on.
Thank you, Craig. Wilson Jones will now report on the company's activities and provide other information regarding the company's operations. Today's presentation is being webcast. An audio replay will be available on our website for approximately 12 months. The remarks that follow, including the videos shown at this meeting, include statements that we believe to be forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks that could cause actual results to be materially different. Those risks include, among others, matters that we've described in our annual report on Form 10-K, filed with the SEC on November 19, 2019, our quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the first quarter of fiscal year 2020, filed on January 29, 2020, and other filings we make with the SEC.
We disclaim any obligation to update these forward-looking statements, which may not be updated until our next quarterly earnings press release, if at all. References in his remarks to a quarter or a year are to our fiscal quarter or fiscal year, unless stated otherwise.
Thanks very much. Now we will turn it over to Wilson. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Craig. Good morning! How about this new headquarters? Yeah. Come on, the forward-looking statements is supposed to really get you excited about, what's about to happen here, what, what's going on here. Hey, we want to thank all that's joining us this morning, too, on the webcast. We appreciate your interest in the Oshkosh Corporation. And I'd like to echo what Craig said so well about our board of directors. We are very blessed to have a great board that's really helping us navigate this Fortune 500 company through all the different things going on in the world today. I also want to thank Craig for his support as a chair.
I enjoyed working with Craig and excited that he's going to continue to support us as a director, and then certainly welcome Steve Newlin on as the role of chair, and we're looking forward to working with you, Steve, in that leadership role. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the group sitting behind our board of directors, a leadership team that I am so honored and privileged to work with on a day-to-day basis. You're going to see later in my presentation some significant performance that this team is providing, again, working with this board and working with all 15,000 team members. Now, we have had some changes in our leadership team, all been out in press release, but just to remind you John Pfeifer joined us.
So John, if you don't mind standing up, joined us back in May. John's our Chief Operating Officer, and certainly has hit the ground running as we knew he would, and been a great addition to our leadership team. Our most recent announcement was Dave Sagehorn, our long-term CFO, 20 years with the company, announced his well-deserved retirement. Dave's been my business partner the last several years, so I'm still getting used to the idea of him not being around. But as he does in everything, he's been diligent in coaching and mentoring his successor, and that's Mike Pack, who's joining our leadership team today. So Dave, Mike, would you both stand up? I'd like to give these guys, Dave, especially, a round of applause. Mike, we're looking forward to working with you, and then Dave, certainly well-deserved retirement. Congratulations.
I mentioned global headquarters. Today, Oshkosh Corporation truly is a global company. We have 15,000 team members working around the world, 23 different countries, 150 locations. We're working to design, manufacture, and service equipment built to serve the world. We do have a lot to celebrate. Our focus on people first, Craig mentioned this, our culture is really advancing. We're focusing on three main areas with our team members: engaging, developing, and connecting. I think if you look around this community as one example of our commitment to community, last year, 2019, our Oshkosh team members volunteered over 12,000 hours in community work, 12,000 hours. We're focused on sustainability. We want to be good corporate neighbors here and respect the environment around our facilities.
Our good work internally has led to some really nice awards, some things that maybe we weren't thinking about. Most recently, the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index. This is an index that only a few companies make, and that's a very impressive accomplishment for our team. The World's Most Ethical Companies, most of you know, only 124 companies in the world receive this designation. We received it for the fourth consecutive year, and I would tell you, stay tuned. I think there might be a fifth year coming here pretty soon... And then Wall Street Journal's Best Managed Companies for three years in a row.
Again, a few of the great honors and awards that we've been recognized for, all in recognition and testimony of how this board of directors is working with the leadership team and our 15,000 team members around the world to do things the right way every day. Just going back to fiscal year 2019, another strong year of performance. We had double-digit sales growth in fire and emergency and defense, our operating income margins of at least 10% in three of our four segments. We generated $400 million of free cash, and we returned $425 million of free cash to shareholders. Last week, we announced our Q1 earnings, starting our fiscal year 2020, all in line with our internal expectations, positioning us well for another solid 2020. Now, I want to do something a little different today.
The old cliché, sometimes you forget how far you've come. We've come a long way the last four years, and I thought it would be important to share that with our shareholders today. Again, showing a track record of how a leadership team works closely with the board of directors and the 15,000 team members around the world to deliver some pretty significant performance. Over the four-year period, we delivered a 10% compound annual growth rate on revenue. Even more impressive was our strong operating performance, approximately 26% adjusted operating income over the four-year period. I'll remind you, too, we're doing most of this in fairly mature markets. And even more significant is our bottom-line results, 38%, 38% compound annual growth rate on our earnings per share over the four-year period. Pretty impressive and pretty solid beat down of our peers.
Shareholders, 2019, total shareholder return, 8.2%, more than double the S&P 500. Over the longer-term horizon, take a look at this, approximately 120% total shareholder return. I mean, significantly exceeding those of relevant composite indices. I'll remind you, too, we've been growing the dividend greater than 10% over that four-year period. If you think about an investor that came in in 2016, we've more than doubled that, the value of their investment over this four-year period. And the crowd goes wild. Are you all really getting-? This is usually where I at least get a hallelujah or amen. And we've done it with disciplined capital allocation, driving that strong and flexible balance sheet.
You know, it's a company here that generates a lot of strong free cash flow , and we've made capital allocation a pillar of our strategy. We've got a great track record of returning cash to shareholders through share repurchases and consistently growing our dividend. You know, we want to be good stewards of capital allocation, and we'll continue that path. So you might ask, how are they doing this? You know, he mentioned the mature markets. How are we seeing these significant numbers from a performance standpoint? Well, first of all, we're a different integrated global industrial, and it all starts with our people. If you look at our model, the center of our model is about our people. And then the different side of it, we have some diversity in markets that most global industrials don't have.
We're an industrial that has a vibrant defense business. We've got really good municipal businesses in fire and refuse collection, so that makes us different. And then we're leveraging the integrated approach, our scale, procurement scale across all four segments, operational synergies, along with technology synergies, all leading to this strong financial performance. The more specifics of our success is our spirit of innovation, which persists across the organization. Innovation keeps us vibrant. Today, we have over 850 patents, 1,350 global product developers, and our commitment to innovation and product development is evidenced by the $26 million increase in new product development spending for this year. We continue to create breakthroughs to revolutionize the way people work and MOVE.
Our focus on disruptive technologies continues to make us a leader in product innovation as we are well down the road of electrification, advanced suspensions, telematics, active safety, and digital manufacturing. The focus on leading the product innovation cycle is critical for us as we intend to maintain our broad leadership in the markets we serve. Today, we rank number one in six of the seven large markets that we currently compete in. Innovation and market leadership are part of our strategy, but that's not all. We're advancing manufacturing through operational excellence. Our products are manufactured in world-class global facilities, equipped with cutting-edge technology, and staffed by team members who know exactly who they're building for. It's a complex ecosystem with a simple goal: build products our customers can count on without ever compromising safety or efficiency.
You know, our purpose is about making a difference in the lives of others. When we say that, normally, externally, people believe, okay, that's about the war fighter, the firefighter, keeping technicians working safe at 185 feet. And it is, that is part of our purpose, but it's also an internal purpose of making a difference in the lives of our team members. It's not a slogan that we throw around. We truly are committed to this, and it's showing in our results with inspired team members. I thought today might be neat to share with you one of the many stories we have about making a difference in the lives of others. I'm going to share with you our friend, Daisy, and I'll let you be the judge if we're making a difference in her life.
I never would have thought that I would have had, like, a 401(k) set up already and health insurance of my own and all that other stuff. Like, and I'm only 18, you know? So I think it's pretty cool. After orientation was done, I went to the class, and we started having the class over at McNeilus Steel, and it felt so new and like something that I've never done before. It kind of, like, gave me a little life, you know? I definitely, like, strive to grow, and, like, I want to, you know, learn more, you know, like, all the time. So if they're willing to, like, give me more opportunities to learn, I'm gonna take it, you know?
When I tell people that I'm a welder, they always, like, sit there for a minute, like, "Like, you're a welder, but you're a girl," you know, that kind of thing. And so, like, just being able to say that, you know, like, "I, I weld," you know, "I do a man's job," which is what a lot of people think, and it's kind of empowering to me. A lot of the people here tell me, you know, like, "Well, why?" You know? But, "Why not?" is what I say. Even if you have, like, a little voice in the back of your head saying, you know, "I wanna do that," or, "I wanna try that," I say, do it, because, you know, it's a missed opportunity if you don't do it.
Don't let the negativity get you down because, you know, it's just gonna hold you back from all of your potential.
... Making a difference in the lives of others. That was unscripted, one take. You know, it started out as a video we wanted to make, to help recruit young people in the trades. I think most of you know, access to skilled labor is a big issue for us going forward. But it turned into an inspirational message from an 18-year-old that I think we can all take something away from, and those are the stories that make this company so great, and they're gonna continue to make it great. I have to apologize. I should have had T-shirts made today that say, "What would Daisy say?" Just to remind us that an 18-year-old can inspire, why can't we inspire, too? So everything we do is guided by our core values. It's not a poster on the wall.
It really is our belief system and how we live and work every day. We start off with putting people first. We think if we take great care of our team members, they're gonna take great care of those customers, which will help us take great care of you, our shareholders, and also the communities where we live and work. We persevere. You know, thankfully, back in 1917, there were two men that started this company that refused to give up. After 53 rejection letters, they kept going, and I can tell you that insurgency, to not give up, DNA, is alive and well in this company today. I can give you multiple examples. Probably the one you might remember the most is our defense segment, how they fought through against the world's largest defense contractor and prevailed in the Humvee replacement program, the JLTV.
We do the right thing. World's Most Ethical four years in a row doesn't just happen. We train. We really focus a lot with our team members on doing the right thing. We walk away from anything that's even close to violating our value system. And then we are better together, one I think is most important. I talked about the synergies that we're leveraging in this different integrated global industrial. Talking about the relationships that we're building in this global industrial, all leading to a more diverse and inclusive environment, the culture that we know we need to advance to stay successful in this competitive world. Now, the commitment to the values and the guiding principles of this company are built right in this new headquarters that you're seeing today.
We had four attributes that we wanted to deliver when we started out with the, the construction of this building. Was first, was to ensure a safe, secure, sustainable environment. We were in 39 buildings around town. We weren't providing the most secure environment for our team members. You may have noticed the assistance stations that we have in the parking lots. Single point of entrance, where we can ensure security and safety for our team. We made responsible decisions that respect our environment. We have centralized waste in this building. You ever think about not having a trash can in your office? I get home at night and have some extra Post-it notes every now and then, but it's really a, a spirit of getting up... Here, here you can see one of the stations, and our team members are learning how to...
What goes to compost, what goes to recycle, what goes to landfill. Things that they can take home, again, to help our environment. And then, we created a smart building here, with HVAC and lighting systems that are designed to reduce our energy. Going forward, we have a attribute of promoting team well-being. You know, we want to care not just for the physical, but also the emotional health of our team members. We have the U, Oshkosh University, designed for our, our team member development in both the personal and professional areas. If you go in our cafeteria, we provide healthy food choices for our team members. We really believe that if we can help our team members be successful in life, they're gonna be wildly successful in this business.
Our goal is to enable team members to leave each day better than they were when they came in. The next attribute is about fostering a productive and collaborative work environment. You know, when you're in 39 different buildings, it's kind of hard to build relationships. I think you can all agree, relationships are better when you're face-to-face versus on the phone. I was walking on the third floor when we first moved in, and there were two team members there, and they were just giddy. They were happy. And I said, "So you like the building?" And they said, "Oh, yeah, we like the building, but you should know we've been working together for several years, same value stream. First time we've met in person." First time they met in person.
So the good news as I was walking away, said, "And by the way, we've already got some ideas on how to improve our process to better support our internal customers." That's what it's about, building those relationships within this company. It's not just relationships within our team members. This whole conference center here, we've made that available to our community friends. We had the Rotarians in, we've had Kiwanis in, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Fox Valley Tech did some planning sessions here. We believe the better we have relationships with our community partners, the better it's gonna work for our organizational brand, and we want to continue to support our communities. So lastly, we wanted to celebrate our purpose and our story here. You know, we didn't look really like that Fortune 500 company that we were and we're performing.
This allows us to do this. What was the first thing you noticed when you walked in the front door? Well, hopefully, it was our people wall, 'cause it starts with our people. That's what we want to show as people come in. It, it really is about our people, and our goal is to have all of our team members and their stories cycle through this wall every other year. You know, the building is symbolic of who we are, our impact on the world, and the fact that we are truly better together. As you leave today, we want you to remember what makes Oshkosh different. We are well-positioned for success. We have a positive long-term outlook. We're gonna continue to deliver, to deliver for shareholders by focusing on people, executing our MOVE strategy, driving innovation, practicing good operational excellence, and deploying smart capital allocation.
I do want to thank you today for your interest in our company and attending our shareholder meeting today. We're going to conclude today's meeting with a short video. Pat Davidson and Jeff Watt, our two investor relations gentlemen, will be in the back of the room if you do have some questions. The board, myself, and our leadership team are gonna be exiting and moving up to start our February board meeting. Thanks again for your interest in the Oshkosh Corporation.