I’m in a different position than most CEO’s. I’m a founder. I’m not a hired CEO. Now, I can be fired by the board, but most CEO’s are hired by the board.
Our business is all about helping someone – a founder, a CEO – building a great business. It’s not about seeing our names in the press.
If I had to probably define and characterize my job, and maybe the job of a CEO today in this global world, highly volatile, uncertain, and when you need to transform is to be the catalyst for change. That’s probably the definition I would give to my job. I’m the catalyst.
The only thing worse than a coach or CEO who doesn’t care about his people is one who pretends to care. People can spot a phony every time.
I’ve been a comedian since I was fourteen. But I’ve never really been a CEO.
If hearing that the CEO of Apple is gay can help someone struggling to come to terms with who he or she is, or bring comfort to anyone who feels alone, or inspire people to insist on their equality, then it’s worth the trade-off with my own privacy.
Every time you make the hard, correct decision you become a bit more courageous, and every time you make the easy, wrong decision you become a bit more cowardly. If you are CEO, these choices will lead to a courageous or cowardly company.
During the 2005 Bush tax holiday, corporations didn’t bring back the billions they stashed overseas to build new factories, increase wages, or create more jobs. The lion’s share of that windfall went to CEO raises and stock buybacks for investors on Wall Street.
I tend to think that free-market conservative principles are the best ones for the CEO of a state.
Being CEO of AMD is a tremendous opportunity to influence the industry and influence the future of computing.
I’ve been a comedian since I was fourteen. But I’ve never really been a CEO.
I took on the role of CEO, which involves directing the Management Team and overall day-to-day operations of 500.
It’s easier to coach a technical founder how to be CEO and manage a business than it is to teach a professional CEO the nuances of that particular business.
I’ve signed many documents as president and CEO as required by law. I signed every single document that we were required to file – every single one of them.
I don’t hold myself out as a role model. I don’t believe that everyone should make the same choices; that everyone has to want to be a CEO, or everyone should want to be a work-at-home mother. I want everyone to be able to choose. But I want us to be able to choose unencumbered by gender choosing for us.
While they’re in WWE, we absolutely have a health and wellness policy. I’ll probably always say ‘we,’ even though I’ve resigned as the CEO. It’s kind of hard to break a 30-year habit.
One of the ideas that I wanted to highlight, which is actually a very bipartisan idea – it’s not just about conservatives – is this worship of wealth, the CEO saviour.
All too often, a corporate innovation initiative starts and ends with a board meeting mandate to the CEO followed by a series of memos to the staff, with lots of posters and one-day workshops. This typically creates ‘innovation theater’ but very little innovation.
As a female founder and CEO, it is important to me to support other women as they build their businesses.
While it may be tempting to bask fully in the glory of success, remember: When a CEO takes too much credit for the good, they will receive far too much criticism for the bad.
The president of the United States is a commander-in-chief, and the president of the United States, you know, executes the laws and tries to motivate the American public to make changes that are necessary. It’s not necessarily a CEO type of position.
I don’t think everyone wants to be a CEO.
I found myself in a meeting on my 13th birthday, which I really had no idea the enormity of, but I was in a meeting with the CEO of Atlantic Records, who sort of signed me right then and there as I was playing guitar for him.
As CEO of Accenture, I am not French anymore. When I’m in India, I am Indian. We are a company with no physical headquarters. We operate on a virtual level. Our leadership meetings are teleconferences, which is why the Board asked me to stay on in France. And I tell others to stay in their own countries.
When I first met YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, I was moderating a panel she was on for Harvard alums. We were both wrapping up our maternity leaves. She had just had her fifth child; I’d just had my second. We traded tips on maternity clothes, and I peppered her with questions about how she finds her balance.
Having a strong sense of self is fundamental to you, no matter what you’re doing. I don’t care if you’re a stay at home mom raising kids or if you’re the CEO of a corporation. It’s really important for your survival.
I was an All-American in wrestling in high school, was National Champion in Chinese kickboxing in 1999 and have spent a lot of time around professional athletes, which includes my eight-plus years as CEO of a sports nutrition company.
I’m the CEO of A$AP Worldwide. But as you can see, when I’m with them, everybody’s equal. We don’t really base our love off of finances or who’s superior by financial status. We’re all equal. When I’m with them, I’m letting them shine ’cause it’s just like how it used to be. They still there. I’m just chilling out front.
The reality is that companies are full of things that are left unspoken. And even when they are out in the open, the CEO is almost always the last to know.
One of the big failures for the big auto companies is that even the CEO and the top management often don’t understand design and manufacturing. As a CEO, you have to make decisions; you need to have knowledge.
I joined the board of Etsy when it was just three founders, and I helped recruit the COO and CTO, Chad Dickerson, who later became the CEO.
If you have a life which is adrenaline-charged all week long because you’re a powerful CEO, or you have responsibilities and you’re committed to the people you look after, it’s very difficult on weekends to sit around the garden. So you probably look for something which gives you the same sort of adrenaline buzz.
Talking about Apple v. Microsoft without mentioning the Internet and the browser is like talking about WWII without talking about the nuke. Framing the conversation just in terms of open v. closed operating systems, the quality of the hardware or software or who the CEO was, is silly.
A leadership culture is one where everyone thinks like an owner, a CEO or a managing director. It’s one where everyone is entrepreneurial and proactive.
If you want a CEO role, you have to prepare for it with a vengeance.
The facts are the vice president’s company that he was CEO of, that did business with sworn enemies of the United States, paid millions of dollars in fines for providing false financial information, it’s under investigation for bribing foreign officials.
Personal ambition is ‘I want to be CEO.’ Greater vision ambition is, ‘I want to lead this company so that people want to work here.’
Building a great team is the lifeblood of any startup, and finding great talent is one of the hardest and costliest tasks any CEO will ever face.
I do believe I have certain strengths as a female CEO, such as having another level of awareness through emotional intelligence.
Being the first female CEO of one of the Big Four, I certainly intend to pay it forward.
Maybe it’s whiner’s fatigue, but I’m getting tired of hearing about how hard it is to start a company and be a CEO. It’s not that hard.
Am I as experienced, or mature, or smart as others CEOs? No probably not, but there’s something, I think, very useful about having a founder as the CEO.
I highly appreciate the work of Ed Woodward, the CEO of Manchester United.
I always believe that, as you start out, while you should have a big dream – a big goal – but it’s also important to move step by step. So, you know, frankly, if you ask me, when I started as a management trainee in 1984, I don’t know that I really thought that I would become the CEO.
The most challenging part of being CEO is communicating to 200,000 people what you want done.
I liked being CEO of Blockbuster, but my job is to put it on the bottom line for shareholders.
What’s important about my election into the CEO role at Deloitte is to provide a role model for the next generation of diverse leaders at Deloitte.
Hell will freeze over before this CEO implements another employee benefit in this culture.
I think the most important thing is to achieve what you set out to achieve. Just being a CEO in itself is not success. I would not relate success to a title or a position.
When I became CEO, I was really worried that we were in commoditized segments that were mature and no longer growing. So we made a radical pivot into health technology because that is one of the world’s unmet needs.
Board meetings should not be for the benefit of the board. They should be for the benefit of the CEO and the senior team.
As a former CEO and senior executive, there was a time when I did not quite understand the profound impact a CEO has on the culture of a company, even though I always knew culture was important.
When I became CEO of Xerox 10 years ago, the company’s situation was dire. Debt was mounting, the stock sinking and bankers were calling. People urged me to declare bankruptcy, but I felt personally responsible for tens of thousands of employees.
