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CEOs are not paid for working hard, they are paid for BEING RIGHT, aka making the right strategic decisions. Bad CEO can bankrupt the company, good CEO can grow

by 988747 4y ago

CEOs are not paid for working hard, they are paid for BEING RIGHT, aka making the right strategic decisions. Bad CEO can bankrupt the company, good CEO can grow it's revenue ten times. You pay CEOs for their experience and expertise in running companies, not for the number of hours worked.

micromacrofoot 4y ago
CEOs are wrong all the time, they are also paid so much for being fired there’s a term for it: “golden parachute”
- Jcowell 4y ago
  Yeah the OP comment doesn’t make sense to me. Right or wrong a CEO will probably make more than you regardless.
- pclmulqdq 4y ago
  If you paid the CEO of McDonald's the same amount as a burger flipper, you are going to get someone who is wrong much more frequently. When we see that CEOs get things wrong, that seems to be more of an artifact of the future being hard to predict than any individual being stupid.
  - micromacrofoot 4y ago
    Ask a CEO to flip burgers and you'll find they'll make a lot of mistakes too. CEOs have specific education and/or experience to help them make better decisions. They suck just as much as anyone else at unknowns.
    - pclmulqdq 4y ago
      I'll bite: The CEO would do just fine at flipping burgers if that were their job. Honestly, after only a few weeks of training, the CEO will probably do better at flipping burgers than the average employee. Everyone sucks at a job when they start out and it's a strawman to say that if you took the CEO to flip burgers for a day, they would suck at it compared to someone who has been flipping burgers for years.
      - micromacrofoot 4y ago
        It's no more of a strawman than saying that CEOs would be wrong more often if they were paid the same as a burger flipper. > the CEO will probably do better at flipping burgers than the average employee this is the same old magical thinking "CEO's are special people" bullshit
        Jensson 4y ago
        IQ helps predict job performance even among unskilled labor. CEO's tend to have high IQ, so you'd expect them to perform better than average people in unskilled labor as well once they have gotten comfortable with the role. (Statistical expect, that is the statistically expected performance of CEO's at the role vs the statistically expected performance of typical current employee, would still be lots of overlap) The following study shows this connection for low skilled job. It also shows that the connection has to do with IQ correlating with better understanding of the role, so wont show until after the worker has learned it, but the connection is still there so you'd expect the CEO to learn the role better than an average employee. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/
        micromacrofoot 4y ago
        That article concludes that it's very risky to use IQ tests to measure just about anything because there are heaps of weak data around them > As others have pointed out, statistical corrections are no magical compensation for weak data and that it is risky to reach conclusions about test validities from those currently available (Oswald & McCloy, 2003; Russell & Gilliland, 1995). The only solution is properly conducted primary studies, with larger representative samples, better measures, and so on. Here's the important bit that basically advises not using IQ tests in the exact way that you're using them: > Until they are available, investigators should be extremely cautious about disseminating conclusions about IQ test validities, from correlations between IQ and job performance. CEO is a job title, not a measure of intelligence, or even job performance. There are no shortage of shitty CEOs, just as there are no shortage of shitty performers in just about every possible job.
dgb23 4y ago
That's an idealistic, maybe even naive point of view. There are plenty of CEOs who generally make bad decisions and take increasingly more money while their companies lose money, their best workers, their most innovative projects and so on. Hierarchical power structures are always prone to corruption and value extraction from the bottom to the top. In fact the above is so prevalent that I'm specifically admiring leaders who are exceptions, actually take responsibility and care more about their workers, clients and the many other people they impact as opposed to their individual gains via compensation and social currency at the top (board, shareholders etc.) Also CEOs generally work hard regardless of the quality of their work. But they generally have a ton of responsibilities and people to talk to. In terms of time invested per day, it is not uncommon for them to do several hours more work than say an engineer. (It's not the same _kind_ of hard though, I personally find social activities, reading and communication much less exhausting than technical work, but it's also less fun.)
- techdmn 4y ago
  Also likely that your average CEO is not spending time washing dishes, doing the laundry or grocery shopping. There is more capacity for "work" when the only work you do is your day job.

by 988747 4y ago

micromacrofoot 4y ago

CEOs are wrong all the time, they are also paid so much for being fired there’s a term for it: “golden parachute”

Jcowell 4y ago
Yeah the OP comment doesn’t make sense to me. Right or wrong a CEO will probably make more than you regardless.
pclmulqdq 4y ago
If you paid the CEO of McDonald's the same amount as a burger flipper, you are going to get someone who is wrong much more frequently. When we see that CEOs get things wrong, that seems to be more of an artifact of the future being hard to predict than any individual being stupid.
- micromacrofoot 4y ago
  Ask a CEO to flip burgers and you'll find they'll make a lot of mistakes too. CEOs have specific education and/or experience to help them make better decisions. They suck just as much as anyone else at unknowns.
  - pclmulqdq 4y ago
    I'll bite: The CEO would do just fine at flipping burgers if that were their job. Honestly, after only a few weeks of training, the CEO will probably do better at flipping burgers than the average employee. Everyone sucks at a job when they start out and it's a strawman to say that if you took the CEO to flip burgers for a day, they would suck at it compared to someone who has been flipping burgers for years.
    - micromacrofoot 4y ago
      It's no more of a strawman than saying that CEOs would be wrong more often if they were paid the same as a burger flipper. > the CEO will probably do better at flipping burgers than the average employee this is the same old magical thinking "CEO's are special people" bullshit
      - Jensson 4y ago
        IQ helps predict job performance even among unskilled labor. CEO's tend to have high IQ, so you'd expect them to perform better than average people in unskilled labor as well once they have gotten comfortable with the role. (Statistical expect, that is the statistically expected performance of CEO's at the role vs the statistically expected performance of typical current employee, would still be lots of overlap) The following study shows this connection for low skilled job. It also shows that the connection has to do with IQ correlating with better understanding of the role, so wont show until after the worker has learned it, but the connection is still there so you'd expect the CEO to learn the role better than an average employee. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/
        micromacrofoot 4y ago
        That article concludes that it's very risky to use IQ tests to measure just about anything because there are heaps of weak data around them > As others have pointed out, statistical corrections are no magical compensation for weak data and that it is risky to reach conclusions about test validities from those currently available (Oswald & McCloy, 2003; Russell & Gilliland, 1995). The only solution is properly conducted primary studies, with larger representative samples, better measures, and so on. Here's the important bit that basically advises not using IQ tests in the exact way that you're using them: > Until they are available, investigators should be extremely cautious about disseminating conclusions about IQ test validities, from correlations between IQ and job performance. CEO is a job title, not a measure of intelligence, or even job performance. There are no shortage of shitty CEOs, just as there are no shortage of shitty performers in just about every possible job.

dgb23 4y ago

That's an idealistic, maybe even naive point of view. There are plenty of CEOs who generally make bad decisions and take increasingly more money while their companies lose money, their best workers, their most innovative projects and so on. Hierarchical power structures are always prone to corruption and value extraction from the bottom to the top. In fact the above is so prevalent that I'm specifically admiring leaders who are exceptions, actually take responsibility and care more about their workers, clients and the many other people they impact as opposed to their individual gains via compensation and social currency at the top (board, shareholders etc.) Also CEOs generally work hard regardless of the quality of their work. But they generally have a ton of responsibilities and people to talk to. In terms of time invested per day, it is not uncommon for them to do several hours more work than say an engineer. (It's not the same _kind_ of hard though, I personally find social activities, reading and communication much less exhausting than technical work, but it's also less fun.)

techdmn 4y ago
Also likely that your average CEO is not spending time washing dishes, doing the laundry or grocery shopping. There is more capacity for "work" when the only work you do is your day job.