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Corner Office: What does it take to be a modern day CEO


By Shubhranshu Singh


The chief executive officer is modern society‘s most compelling, conflicted, charismatic and famous figures. CEOs are fabulously powerful but their power is also fragile and precariously placed.

CEOs represent an exclusive, highly qualified, well networked, influential and prosperous class of people. They stand as our greatest prophets and our most industrious action heroes. Beyond just running companies and making profits, they’re positioned as the primary producers of global prosperity. Fame follows power and one is not surprised at the veneration.

Moreover, it is not as if blame doesn’t come to them. In fact, that’s a telling thing too. The blame inevitably comes to CEOs as individuals. These occasional scapegoats and ‘fall guys’ perish from memory but the systemic correction rarely happens. Be it the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, HP’s chairperson authorising spying on its Board members, Volkswagen emissions scandal of 2015, Barclay’s Libor manipulation, Exxon Mobil’s climate controversy of 2016 – we see this pattern repeated time and again. These stories offer a counter-narrative, where these fallen heroes are declared villains. The ‘CEO brand’ remains unsullied; it’s the individual who’s a rotten apple.

The CEO brand is multi-faceted such as genius, productivity, drive, intelligence and commitment. The CEO brand stands for charismatic individualism above all. They are priests who worship the high Gods of profitability, efficiency and effectiveness.

The belief thus engendered is that a true CEO always competes and wins. He is a role model for society at large. One who is not just to be admired but actively emulated. This is the commercial redux of our transactional society – winning is the end objective.

Every aspect of economic, organizational, social and cultural life is reduced to an existential and financial contest. The good life, belongs to the successful. As an executive, one is well positioned to earn money and power and make ones dreams come true. All that is required is that one ruthlessly play the game to win. The CEO brand is the poster icon of this gospel. In an age of immersive, ‘always-on’ media it’s not seen as abnormal to glorify ‘winners’. It is hugely amplified via corporate – funded and friendly media coverage.

‘You are the CEO of your life’ or ‘Our country needs a CEO ‘- these types of declarations drives the belief that CEOs are the sources of the secret wisdom of not only how to survive, but to thrive in an exceedingly complex modern world. Never mind if you can’t be an actual CEO, still strive to be the ‘CEO’ of your own life.

Hagiographies of CEOs have become a special sub-genre, explaining the inner working of their minds and promising a life worth billions for just Rs 499/-. Neutron Jack Welch, Lee Iacocca, Chainsaw Al Dunlop, Carly Fiorina, Lou Gerstner, Jamie Dimon, A.G.Lafley, Paul Polman. The list is longer than the Fortune 500. I list professional managers and not ‘entrepreneur- CEOs’ or inheritors. This is because the modern capitalist system is ultimately a managed process. Hence a professional turning into Caesar is of greater consequence.

Why does it matter?
An obsession with ‘being like a CEO’ reduces us to a society of market calculations where success is valued regardless of the costs. It deludes us to worship a singularly powerful executive and makes us enthralled with the very people and values that reduce us to inconsequentiality.

The failure to criticize, question and overturn leads to social, moral and economic bankruptcy. Profit becomes the commanding force and everything is forever on a treadmill .Every good cause is expected to yield a financial return to the giver, worded movingly as ‘Doing well by doing good’. The smallest act of civic mindedness is also a commemoration for PR.

The CEOs we need as brand icons are those who win a reputation for compassion and sustainable development.

We should realise that this form of glorification of executive power is a market directed activity. The conviction that only business-style leadership is necessary for solving organisational, social and economic problems is dangerous. A CEO showcased as the embodiment of the strong, capable and forward-thinking leader is not just operational branding but is ideological.

Capitalism is endangered. It is plagued by corruption, humiliation, disaster, economic calamities and financial instability. Our planet and society is existentially threatened by ecological unsustainability, environmental degradation, unemployment and poverty. It needs all of us –not just a band of faux super heroes – to join the battle.

The world cannot afford the CEO brand. The capitalist world must return to the goodness of managerial commodity.

The author is global brand head for Royal Enfield. Views expressed are personal.





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