Taking Nominations for Worst CEO: Greenberg
By: One of my favorite year-end tasks is naming the year’s worst corporate CEO.
There is no shortage of names this year. The most obvious, winning by default, is Jon Corzine. We’ll put him in a special category, perhaps Super-Worst CEO.
But there are so many other possibilities. Already—after putting out a casting call on Twitter, Facebook and Google+, there appears to be a pattern.
Among those mentioned: Jim Balsillie and Michael Lazaridis—co-CEOs of Blackberry maker Research in Motion ; Avon’s Andrea Jung; Hewlett Packard ex-CEO Leo Apotheker and Andrew Mason of Groupon .
The one that has stunned me the most, especially based on the exceedingly high number mentions so far: Reed Hastings of Netflix . (Surprised—because a few years ago, based on exceptional execution, he could have easily been, in the minds of many, CEO of the Year.)
Let us know what you think in the comment section below, and we’ll follow up in a week or so with a poll.
But this warning: The winner won’t be just a popularity (or lack, thereof) contest: Before I choose, in conjunction with others at CNBC, I’ll review various metrics and, of course, the company’s stock performance over the past 12 months.
We’ll reveal the winners next week.
May the worst performer win.
P.S.: None of this is personal. Just comes with the territory of reporting on (and for the nominees—running) publicly held companies.
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