For the First Time Ever, a Researcher Finds Out What CEOs Actually Do
I have heard folks say that CEOs deserve what they make through the time they put in.
While some CEOs maybe put in many more than the standard, that average is about 60 hrs per week, according to a revelation that CEOs worked:
- On average, 9.7 hours per weekday, that is 48.5 hrs a week
- Around 4 hrs per weekend day
- 2.4 hours per vacation day
Which adds up to 62.5 hrs a week.
What did they do during that time? Around 75% of CEO time is scheduled in advance, with 25% spontaneous.
The malfunction of hours spent working is interesting:
- 25% on people and relationships
- 25% on functional and business unit reviews
- 16% on organization and culture
- 21% on strategy
- 3% on professional development
- 4% on mergers and acquisitions
- 4% on operating plans
- Surprisingly, 1% on crisis management
Here is a sample, provided by the Harvard Business Review, of just one day for one CEO.
In an intriguing finding, 61% of CEO communication? It is face-to-face. 24% is electronic, also 15% good old-fashioned phone and letters.
According to Michael Porter, University Professor at the Harvard Business school, “We were able to look at 27 numerous CEOs across a wide range of business, the average size about $13 billion, so these are huge, complex, in some cases international companies. We tracked them for 13 weeks, or three months, 24/7. There’s never been information like this before– we have never known what CEOs do.”
What is not exempified in a study such as this? The fact that Chief Executive Officer pay has risen much more quickly since the Great Recession of 2008 than for anybody else. Without a doubt, regular employees’ pay has failed, and CEOs now make an average of 271 times normal workers’ pay. (It is worth noting that this proportion is not as high as it was in the years leading up to the Big Recession, but it is the highest since then).
This number was 20-to-1 in 1965 also 59-to-1 in 1989. Furthermore, at some companies, such as Honeywell, it is 333-to-1. That means for every $1 a typical regular employee makes there, the Chief Executive Officer makes $333.
I will leave it to you to decide if that is good or bad.
Read the original article on Big Think.
