Steve Jobs is the best CEO in the world

BANGALORE, INDIA: Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been ranked the best-performing CEO in the world by the prestigious Harvard Business Review (HBR). Yun Jong-Yong of Samsung Electronics came second, while Reliance Industries CEO Mukesh Ambani came fifth on the list. Ambani is the only Indian among the top 50 CEOs on the list.

Those who made it to the top 10 list of HBR also include Alexey Miller (Russian energy firm Gazprom), John Chambers (Cisco Systems), John C. Martin (Gilead Sciences), Jeffrey P. Bezos (Amazon.com), Margaret C. Whitman (Ebay), Eric E. Schmidt (Google) and Hugh Grant (Monsanto), which shows that IT bosses lead the world when it comes to creating long term share holder value.

HBR said that to create its ranking, it identified the CEOs of all publicly the traded companies that had made Standard & Poor’s Global 1200 or BRIC 40 lists since 1997.

“Considering companies from Brazil, Russia, India, and China in our research was critical, given the growth in emerging economies. To be included, a CEO had to have assumed the job no earlier than January 1995 and no later than December 2007.”

Due to this, the likes of Jack Welch, Warren Buffett, Larry Ellison and Bill Gates do not find mention in the list as HBR.

Ambani is also ranked number two among the top 10 emerging market CEOs with Miller at the top. K.V. Kamath of the ICICI Bank, ranked number 9, is the other Indian in the list.

“On an average, the top 50 CEOs increased the wealth of their shareholders by $48.2 billion,” said HBR.

"They delivered a total shareholder return of 997 percent during their time in office. That translates into a spectacular annual return of 32 percent."

The HBR put Ambani in the list of "up-through-the-ranks leaders" along with the Samsung boss.

Jobs, it said, delivered a whopping 3,188 per cent industry-adjusted return (34 per cent compounded annually) after he rejoined Apple as CEO in 1997, when the company was in dire straits. From that time until the end of September 2009, Apple's market value increased by $150 billion.

HBR said none of the top three CEOs had an MBA. Ambani and Chambers were the only two in the top five to hold degrees in business administration.

(With inputs from IANS)