By Larry C. Paxton
Knowing the characteristics of a company’s leadership can be key to having a higher probability of success when you desire to consult, sell/market to/for, or have an interest in a job at a large company. Here are some observations on CEOs based on a compilation by the PBRMarketTools.com team based on The PBR1000, which currently contains key demographic, financial, industry, and people data on 1002 of the largest publicly traded US corporations. This article will focus on longevity of CEOs in these companies. Additional articles about CEOs will follow in the coming months.
By year in descending order here are the current counts of CEOs who have been appointed:
- 2013(through August 31): 76 CEOs appointed
- 2012: 97
- 2011: 93
- 2010: 85
- 2009: 69(420 total over 4 2/3 years, 90 CEO appointments average/year)
- 2004-2008: 301(5 years, 60 CEO appointments average/year)
- Before 2004: 281
The longest serving CEO in The PBR1000 is Leslie Wexner, Chairman/CEO and Founder of L Brands (PBR239), serving since 1963.
The median year for the 1002 CEOs is 2007. But keep in mind that 485 CEOs, just under half, took on that position between 2008 and August, 2013. By the end of 2013 the median year should be 2008.
In terms of revenues in the top 100 companies, basically those who did over $27 billion in FY2012, half of the CEOs came on board between 2009 and the end of August this year. CEOs in companies that did around $1.8 billion to $27 billion had a median start date in 2007, and CEOs in companies that did $1 billion to around $1.8 billion had the longest median appointment year of 2005.
CEOs is some key industries have interesting longevities. Here are some examples:
- SIC 1520-1540, basically general building contractors, 7 companies, median CEO appointment year: 2003
- SIC 2000, food and kindred products, 7 companies, 2012
- SIC 2911, petroleum refining, 13 companies, 2010
- SIC 3310-3357, steel manufacturing, 17 companies, 2009
- SIC 3411-3490, basically metal fabrication, 11 companies, 2004
- SIC 3711-3790, transportation manufacturing, 37 companies, 2009
- SIC 4512-4522, air transportation, 12 companies, 2004
- SIC 6200-6282, investment services, 24 companies, 2005
- SIC 6798, real estate investment trusts, 19 companies, 2002
- SIC 7011, hotels/motels, 10 companies, 2005
- Sic 7370-7374, software programming services(Google, Facebook, …), 28 companies, 2008
- SIC 8050-8090, hospitals and health care related services, 17 companies, 2004
The top 6 states, accounting for 480 of the 1002 The PBR1000 companies, had the following average median CEO appointment year(State, The PBR1000 company count, median CEO appointment year):
- California, 108, 2007
- Texas, 102, 2007
- New York, 98, 2006
- Illinois, 67, 2008
- Ohio, 55, 2007
- Pennsylvania, 50, 2010
Bottom line, by the end of this year, around 50% of CEOs in The PBR1000 will have been in their job for 6 years or less, meaning, of course, the other 50% for 7 years or more.
How does that compare to the average American worker? According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute the median length of time in a job for an American worker in 2012 was 5.4 years, which is slightly more than the 5 years median in 1983.
I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on all this and we will have more reports about CEOs coming out on a regular basis.
More details are available in The PBR1000 CEO Longevity Report which is a series of Microsoft EXCEL worksheets that includes each company’s CEO name, other titles they hold in the company, year they became CEO, and a hotlink to a brief biography about them. Just go to www.PBRMarketTools.com and follow the link to the Order page.
Larry Paxton is the President/CEO and founder of Pax Business Resources, LLC(PBR). www.PBRMarketTools.com is the marketing research arm of the company. In the past he has worked for a couple of The PBR1000 companies and provided a variety of products and services to many of them over the years. PBR is in its 4th year. Larry looks forward to being in that median group of CEOs with 7 years of service or more on the job.
