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I don't understand the division of CEO roles into two CO-CEOs. Is this generally effective? I would imagine this would make tough decision making nearly impos

I don't understand the division of CEO roles into two CO-CEOs. Is this generally effective? I would imagine this would make tough decision making nearly impossible? Who takes the blame for bad decisions vs. good decisions? Anyone have some history on why Waymo has two CEOs?

refulgentis 4y ago
This is a really good question...its unusual but I didn't process it as such because it read as a smart & effective split. Last CEO was from Detroit, co-CEOs are effectively technical lead and ops lead. Makes sense for what is a one of kind tech lab hitched to a ride hailing business. You also made me think deeper about the unusual situations where I've seen co-leads at a FAANG. Honestly? I think it helped. There's a very strong "bullshit" culture that can set in. It is a mere step beyond your average upper class Americans cultural mileu, so its underrated how degenerate it turns with that one more step: suddenly, leadership is never leading, and being extremely territorial about general subject matter while never doing anything ambituous enough to fail can leads to cylical ineffectiveness. With two leads, there's two people to appeal to, and two people who need to argue and agree eventually. They can't sidestep that conflict is a crucial part of polishing.
akomtu 4y ago
I guess that when the last CEO was leaving, he had two candidates to replace him, but both treatened to leave if the other is made the boss, so that CEO made the solomon decision: he made them both "ceo".
bergenty 4y ago
I think it’s a great idea. Also a great model for benevolent dictators.
reducesuffering 4y ago
A company the size of Alphabet doesn't even understand the meaning of the adjective "chief", as in, "most important." Also, the "co-CEO" is a womens' studies lawyer that spent 16 years managing "public policy" at each failing company de-jour of the past decades: AOL, Yahoo, eBay, and is now "co-CEO" of an extremely technical company? Yikes.

refulgentis 4y ago

This is a really good question...its unusual but I didn't process it as such because it read as a smart & effective split. Last CEO was from Detroit, co-CEOs are effectively technical lead and ops lead. Makes sense for what is a one of kind tech lab hitched to a ride hailing business. You also made me think deeper about the unusual situations where I've seen co-leads at a FAANG. Honestly? I think it helped. There's a very strong "bullshit" culture that can set in. It is a mere step beyond your average upper class Americans cultural mileu, so its underrated how degenerate it turns with that one more step: suddenly, leadership is never leading, and being extremely territorial about general subject matter while never doing anything ambituous enough to fail can leads to cylical ineffectiveness. With two leads, there's two people to appeal to, and two people who need to argue and agree eventually. They can't sidestep that conflict is a crucial part of polishing.

akomtu 4y ago

I guess that when the last CEO was leaving, he had two candidates to replace him, but both treatened to leave if the other is made the boss, so that CEO made the solomon decision: he made them both "ceo".

bergenty 4y ago

I think it’s a great idea. Also a great model for benevolent dictators.

reducesuffering 4y ago

A company the size of Alphabet doesn't even understand the meaning of the adjective "chief", as in, "most important." Also, the "co-CEO" is a womens' studies lawyer that spent 16 years managing "public policy" at each failing company de-jour of the past decades: AOL, Yahoo, eBay, and is now "co-CEO" of an extremely technical company? Yikes.