meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
Freakonomics Radio

What Does a C.E.O. Actually Do?

Freakonomics Radio

Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher

Documentary, Society & Culture

4.6 β€’ 32K Ratings

πŸ—“οΈ 18 January 2018

⏱️ 39 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

They're paid a fortune β€” but for what, exactly? What makes a good C.E.O. β€” and how can you even tell? Is "leadership science" a real thing β€” or just airport-bookstore mumbo jumbo? We put these questions to Mark Zuckerberg, Richard Branson, Indra Nooyi, Satya Nadella, Jack Welch, Ray Dalio, Carol Bartz, David Rubenstein, and Ellen Pao. (Part 1 of a special series, "The Secret Life of C.E.O.'s.")

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

So I have one gripe about chip bags, especially for the single serve, it seems to me very suboptimal to have the only opening at the top, where you kind of have to jam your hand in there and you can't really see what you're getting.

0:19.2

Wouldn't it be better to have a bag that just laid out all the chips on the package,

0:22.6

like a nice picnic blanket or something? Have you ever thought about that?

0:25.4

But imagine that you're walking around eating a bag of chips, which a lot of people do.

0:29.7

How would that work?

0:31.2

If you open out the lays too much and a gust of wind comes by,

0:34.5

you're going to see a lot of chips flying.

0:36.2

We have to worry about all these

0:37.5

little practical things. That's Indra Noe. Good morning. Noee is the CEO of PepsiCo. So when it

0:46.4

comes to little practical things to worry about, she has a lot of them. PepsiCo has more than

0:51.9

260,000 global employees and over 100 brands and trademarks,

0:57.4

including 22 that each do at least a billion dollars a year in sales. Those include Pepsi,

1:03.7

of course, and Gatorade and Tropicana and Quaker Foods. There are also seven separate billion-dollar chip brands, lays, ruffles,

1:13.8

Doritos, Tostitos, Cheetos, Fritos, and Walkers.

1:18.1

So I'm out in the marketplace almost every week, looking to see how our products look like

1:23.0

on the shelf, not from a CEO lens, more from a consumer lens. Because at the end of the day, I'm not just a

1:28.7

CEO, I'm also a consumer. I'm a shopkeeper. I'm a gatekeeper of my family. So I look at our

1:34.1

business through a different lens. And then I come back and I talk to my people about what I

1:39.1

saw was good and what wasn't really good. Do you find it surprising that the CEO of a $170 billion company

1:49.0

micromanages her potato chips?

1:51.9

What about the CEO of an even bigger company when built on silicon chips?

1:55.9

I'm talking about Microsoft CEO, Satcha Nadella.

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright Β© Tapesearch 2025.