MBA degree not required to become a successful CEO

Updated on: Tuesday, December 22, 2009

New York: One need not necessarily be a management graduate to become a successful CEO.

According to a list of best performing CEOs by the Harvard Business Review, 36 out of the world's top 50 chief executive officers do not hold a masters degree in business administration (MBA).

The top three leaders - IT giant Apple's Steve Jobs, Yun Jong-Yong of Samsung Electronics and Russian energy firm Gazprom's Alexey Miller -- are not management graduates, as per the survey.

Among the top five best performing CEOs, John T Chambers of Cisco Systems and Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Industries hold degrees in business administration.

Interestingly, most of the succesful leaders, who do not hold a business administration degrees, are from the energy sector, followed by IT industry or are Internet based, according to the survey.

As per the list, about six CEOs from the energy sector and four from IT industry do not hold management degrees. Job delivered a whopping 3,188 per cent industry adjusted return (34 per cent compounded annually) after he joined Apple as CEO in 1997, when the firm was in dire shape. From that period until the end of September 2009, Apple's market value increased by USD 150 billion.

"Yun is an example of a leader who has stayed out of the limelight. During his tenure he capably transformed a maker of memory chips and me-too products into an innovator selling digital products such as leading edge cell phones," the survey said. Yun ran Samsung Electronics from 1996 to 2008.

Among other best performing CEOs who do not have MBA degree Internet search engine Google chief Eric E Schmidt Martin, who is placed at the sixth place, led Gilead Sciences, a bio pharmaceutical company delivered an industry-adjusted return of 2,054 per cent, or 26 per cent on an annualised basis.

Bezo and Schmidt are ranked at the seventh and the ninth place, respectively, in the list. China Mobile's Wang Jinazhou, Japanese Canon's Fujio Mitari, Fred Kindle of Swiss-based ABB and Hyundai Motor Chung Hung Mong are also among those who do not have management degree.

In the list of top 50 leaders, only 14 CEOs hold an MBA degree, including online market place eBay's Margaret C Whitman, material company Monsanto Hugh Grant, Consumer goods firm Reckitt Benckiser Group of Bart Becht and Symantec's John W Thompson.

MBA degree not required to become a successful CEO

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