Common Misconceptions About CEOs

With responsibility for just about every single person in a business, there’s no doubt that CEOs have a lot on their plate.

There are certainly plenty of rewards that go with the packed in-tray but another consideration for those looking to climb to the very top of the corporate ladder is the number of myths and misconceptions about the role.

Here we’ll attempt to shed some light on the truth behind the headlines.

All that glitters is gold

The glamorous life of the CEO, eh? It must be all about buying the next holiday home, buying a fleet of supercars, and struggling to choose an insurance policy for a new yacht, right?

The truth is this is rarely the case for the large number of people across the world who hold the job title of chief executive officer.

Sure, there are some high-profile CEOs who might live extravagant lifestyles and court the media’s attention. But these are very much in the minority across the board.

Most CEOs are following their passion and dedicated to making their company a better place to work, more attractive to invest in and a leader in giving back to the communities that have been their foundations

The CEO owns the business

In large numbers of cases across the world, this is not the case.

Of course, any publicly traded company that appoints a CEO is owned by its shareholders. Now, the CEO may well be one of those people (and may be a majority shareholder to boot) but conflating the two can often place unfair expectations on CEOs who may answer to others.

In the case of limited companies, a CEO may be appointed by an owner who wishes to remain out of the public glare and task their top exec with making difficult decisions, such as formulating responses to ongoing disruption in the job market.

CEOs certainly wield a lot of power in any business, but it is far from accurate in the case of many to suggest that they, and they alone, have the final say over all business matters.

Net worth figures

Each and every day you might see news stories focusing on high-ranking executives with claims that they are worth millions, if not billions. There are even entire internet sites dedicated to reporting the ‘net worth’ of others.

This leads to immediate misconceptions that this monetary figure must be instantly available to an individual. Even though in reality, it’s a reflection of a present market value and not a realised sum sitting in someone’s bank balance. It may even compromise their safety if they are perceived publicly to be wealthier than they perhaps are.

If they are even accurate in the first place, most likely these sums relate to entire portfolios that might include property, stocks and shares, among other assets. It’s also important to point out that should a high-net-worth individual such as Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk decide to sell all of their shares in their respective businesses, they would almost instantly crash the value of their stocks as well as affect the value of their sector.

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