3 ms·

CEOs don’t have to make no mistakes to be valuable - at the scale of google they just have to make 1% less mistakes than another CEO to justify a high worth to

by Closi 4y ago

CEOs don’t have to make no mistakes to be valuable - at the scale of google they just have to make 1% less mistakes than another CEO to justify a high worth to the board. This is often why the salaries are so high - they generally want the right candidate regardless of cost and then don’t want the CEO to leave. CEO realises their value to the company and is generally good at extracting value, so negotiates a high pay package. But at the scale of google, paying 100x less for a leader that makes 1% errors is probably not worthwhile when that 1% error could ruin the company.

rawgabbit 4y ago
I agree that CEOs have to make less mistakes than their competitors. In capital driven markets, company performance is measured relative to its competitors. With that said, I still don't believe CEO pay is justifiable. It is the board of directors who are responsible to the shareholders. The CEO is supposed to execute the will of the board. In reality, the board and the CEO are often are clueless about the future as anyone else. E.g., for decades now, big tech has been lobbying for increasing the H1B quota saying they can't find enough workers. Now, big tech is saying all this hiring is a mistake. E.g., on HN we have endless conversations about the mythical man-month and that measuring lines of code and pull requests are just ridiculous measures of productivity. What is even more ridiculous, is that managers now want workers to return to the office, to have butts in seats, because that is the only way they can measure productivity. TLDR: big tech, CEOs, and managers are clueless like everyone else; they have just have the gift of dressing up their S@IT using pseudo scientific management mumbo jumbo.
ric2b 4y ago
And how exactly are these error rates being measured? And why don't the laws of supply and demand apply here? Perhaps because it's not a real market and no one actually cares about what you're saying, they're just all in a club and we aren't in it.

by Closi 4y ago

rawgabbit 4y ago

I agree that CEOs have to make less mistakes than their competitors. In capital driven markets, company performance is measured relative to its competitors. With that said, I still don't believe CEO pay is justifiable. It is the board of directors who are responsible to the shareholders. The CEO is supposed to execute the will of the board. In reality, the board and the CEO are often are clueless about the future as anyone else. E.g., for decades now, big tech has been lobbying for increasing the H1B quota saying they can't find enough workers. Now, big tech is saying all this hiring is a mistake. E.g., on HN we have endless conversations about the mythical man-month and that measuring lines of code and pull requests are just ridiculous measures of productivity. What is even more ridiculous, is that managers now want workers to return to the office, to have butts in seats, because that is the only way they can measure productivity. TLDR: big tech, CEOs, and managers are clueless like everyone else; they have just have the gift of dressing up their S@IT using pseudo scientific management mumbo jumbo.

ric2b 4y ago

And how exactly are these error rates being measured? And why don't the laws of supply and demand apply here? Perhaps because it's not a real market and no one actually cares about what you're saying, they're just all in a club and we aren't in it.