The Exec-Ed Zone

USA Today ran a great article last week on the corporations that have produced the largest number of current CEO's. It being USA Today all the data is just from the US. The research was done in October by a Standard & Poor's division, Capital IQ, and looked at the 1187 quoted US companies capitalised at $2billion or more, and where their CEO's had worked previously.

The top 20 were as follows, with the number of current CEO's afterwards, the order is defined by the most  CEO's per number of staff employed (ie where you have the best chance of becoming a CEO at a later job). Arthur Andersen the now defunct accountant/consultancy was discounted but would have made the list 20-strong.

1. McKinsey   (16)
2. Deloitte & Touche (8)
3. Baxter International (11)
4.  PwC (10)
5. Ernst & Young (12)
6. Merrill Lynch (7)
7. Motorola (7)
8. Intel (8)
9. Procter & Gamble (12)
10. General Electric (26)
11. Honeywell (10)
12. Novartis (8)
13. PepsiCo (13)
14. Disney (9)
15. ExxonMobil (7)
16. Johnson & Johnson (8)
17. IBM (18)
18. AT&T (13)
19. Citigroup (11)

In a second article it is noted that while P&G may have 12 current alumni as CEO's they have a further 116 as chairmen and CFO's of large US corporations. P&G CEO AG Lafley describes his company as "a leadership engine and talent machine".

Why are these organisations so good at creating leaders? The article argues, with some reason, that they are successful enough to attract high-fliers and big enough to give them space to make mistakes:

"CEOs who were fished from the best corporate streams cite other reasons why a few companies develop so much leadership. Few invest heavily in leadership training and development, they say, and only a few more excel at identifying highfliers and putting them into stretch assignments, both domestic and abroad. The other companies play it safe. They don't force young talent to sink or swim, so when it's time to find a leader, they look outside the company."

While this argument holds water, it cannot be ignored that the world of top-executives, especially in the same sectors, is not a large one. The P&G figure of 128 C-level executives indicates how inter-linked all these executives are. The rule of "it is not what you know but who you know" applies even more in these circles than elsewhere. While a $2billion corporation is not going to select a CEO from off-the-street or out-of-a-hat, it would be interesting to learn about the more whacky or left-field appointments (who are not dynastic) and how they fared.

Does anyone know of any research that discovers how many of these CEO's have MBA's and how many have attended exec-ed programs? I'd like to hear.