Bill Gates is 'world's most respected business leader'

Tech firms are among the most respected in business today - and Bill Gates is the leader most bosses look up to, according to new research.

A survey of CEOs by the Financial Times and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) found Bill Gates still topped the list of most respected business leaders - and he's joined in the top 10 by fellow tech bigwigs Michael Dell at five, Carly Fiorina at eight and Steve Jobs at nine. It's the third year that the Microsoft founder has headed the chart.

David Phillips, partner at PwC, said that Gates tops both for his own efforts and for Microsoft's performance.

"In the case of Bill Gates, I think he's become seen as a great leader in terms of his ability to inspire the organisation... I don't think he's a conventional business manager in any sense of the word," he said. "I think the view [of Gates as a great leader] is coloured to a certain extent by the continued performance of the company."

When asked to pick a 'fantasy board member' for their own companies, the CEOs chose figures including Churchill, Einstein and da Vinci, with the desirable qualities that the fantasy board members had listed as vision, innovation and pioneering genius.

As well as having 'respectable' leaders, the tech heavyweights are also making their presence felt on CEOs' respectability scale.

Microsoft once again comes up trumps - topping other tech titans to take the number two in the world's most respected business list, with IBM following at four, Dell at six and HP at 10.

Phillips said that in part technology's strong showing is down to its presence in people's everyday life but it's also down to the sector taking the lead in innovation.

"All those names are quite familiar in their global brand and global reach," he said. "You find in the innovation part [of the survey], those companies are up there. They dominate innovation."

Advertisement

Talkback 2 comments

  1. How sick can you be, I am drunk and stoned and I can still I can sill throw up at that statement. Anonymous -- 05/05/05

    How sick can you be, I am drunk and stoned and I can still I can sill throw up at that statement.

  2. Billg is both Leader and Manager Bruce Lynn -- 21/09/07

    I disagree with Phillips' comments that Gates is not 'a conventional business manager in any sense of the word'. Gates is a Leader in driving long term vision and initiative and is a Manager in averting short term pitfalls and risks. For a deeper discussion of my persoonal perspectives on this balance, see my posting http://brucelynnblog.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!B5C035B7809F740A!132.entry.

Add your opinion


ZDNet's CIO Vision Series

Customs | Murray Harrison, CIO

Australian Customs CIO Murray Harrison dislikes SLAs and runs away if a vendor talks to him about innovation. In this interview, he also explains why getting excited about gadgets can be dangerous and talks about how Customs' outsourcing strategy has evolved.

Sponsored content

Power Centre - Content from our premier sponsors

Blogs

  • Munir Kotadia iPhone suckers test our patience
    So how many of you have bought a 3G iPhone? Do you feel like a sucker? If you don't, maybe you will once your first bill arrives.
  • Array Westpac bank: AVG's toughest competitor
    The next time you're buying antivirus software, don't go direct to Symantec or McAfee. Don't download free antivirus. And definitely don't see Harvey Norman. Ask your bank — they're quite literally giving the stuff away.
  • Array Will you manage in the exabyte era?
    Mammoth growth in storage volumes is a fact of life, but even so it's helpful to pause occasionally and try and work out whether our information strategies have fallen hopelessly out of step with the pace of technological growth and changes in costs.
  • More blogs »

Tags

Back to top

Featured