When can a founder be a good CEO?
People often say that entrepreneurs who start out as CEO will need to be replaced at some point with a…
People often say that entrepreneurs who start out as CEO will need to be replaced at some point with a…
People take various paths to get to the CEO chair, resulting from a mix of education, experience, and other factors. CEO.com recently published the following infographic – The Long Road to Becoming CEO – that sketches the demographics of S&P 500 and Fortune 500 CEOs. The variety of study and experience depicted speaks to the uniqueness of the CEO role: As I’ve mentioned before, the CEO position is so different that few people are prepared for it, no matter how well they’ve performed in other executive roles. I started this blog to help CEOs address this challenge.
One interesting fact to me as a former engineer is that the most common field of study for S&P 500 CEOs is engineering at 20% (yet the most common functions they come from are finance, operations, marketing, and sales). I recently discussed key considerations for engineers who want to become founders and CEOs.