A Chief Executive Officer, most known as CEO is the highest ranked employee in an organization. A CEO is the face of the company and most of the major decisions are made by a CEO. But that doesn’t mean that CEO is the most powerful person in the company. In an organization, there are quite a few positions available that are higher than CEO. For example, the Chairman, as well as the members of the board of directors, have more power over the CEO.
What is a CEO?
CEO is the short abbreviation of Chief Executive Officer. According to cambridge.org –
“Chief Executive Officer is the main person responsible for managing a company, who is sometimes also the company’s president or chairman of the board”
A CEO is known by many names like a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrative officer (CAO), chief executive (CE), etc. Usually, the CEO is the top position in an organization and he/she is responsible for forming and implementing new plans and making critical decisions. It is the main duty of a CEO to improve the financial condition of the company as well as support the transformation of the company. Generally, the CEO looks after various functions of a company including operations, finance, marketing, sales, human resources, legal, compliance, etc. The CEO work as a bridge between employees, customers, investors, and shareholders.
Who is Higher than the CEO?
Well, the CEO is the highest ranked employee of a company but the CEO also has to answer someone. Usually, the Chairman of the Board of Directors (BoD) appoints a CEO. So, the Chairman or the members of the BoD have more power than a CEO and their position is also higher than a CEO. The Board of Directors members are elected by the company’s shareholders and these members have ultimate governing authority within the management structure. The core responsibility of a BoD is to select and appoint a CEO, review the CEO’s performance, support the CEO, as well as review and approve major policies and decisions.
Responsibilities of a CEO
A CEO plays a very important role in a company. Some key roles and responsibilities of a CEO are –
- A CEO develops strategic objectives and provides direction to bring their visions to reality
- CEO helps the employees and the BoDs to foresee the outcome of the business growth
- It is a very important responsibility of a CEO to implement the proposed plans that are linked with short-term and long-term projects
- A CEO should communicate with all the employees and ensure that the project is running according to the overarching strategy
- A CEO passes the financial responsibility to the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) but closely monitors the budgeting and forecasting of the organization
- A CEO must analyze the industry fluctuation, past revenue, and current financial condition to give an idea about the profitability for the upcoming year
- The CEO is considered the public face of a company; so they are used as an obligatory marketing tool
- The CEO work as the communicator between the BoDs and the employees of the company
- Another key role of a CEO is to review the company’s performance and compare it with the other competitors
- A CEO decides on the potential acquisitions or significant regulatory developments in the industry
List of Chief Officer (CO) Titles
| Title | Abbreviation | Explanation |
| Chief academic officer | CAO | This type of chief officer is responsible for academic administration at universities and other higher education institutions |
| Chief accessibility officer | CAO | They work with senior and disabled people and oversee accessibility and inclusion |
| Chief accounting officer | CAO | Keep track of all types of account and bookkeeping activities |
| Chief administrative officer | CAO | Execute various plans and control business operations |
| Chief analytics officer | CAO | Does various types of data analysis and provide key information to a business |
| Chief Architect | CA | Works in technical companies and designs various types of systems for high availability and scalability |
| Chief artificial intelligence officer | CAIO | Head of AI research department |
| Chief audit executive | CAE | Perform various audits inside a company |
| Chief brand officer | CBO | Promote a brand and also be responsible for the brand’s image, experience, and promise |
| Chief business officer | CBO | Complete various deals on behalf of the company and give various dealing strategies |
| Chief business development officer | CBDO | Offers various business development plans, design and implementation of processes to support business growth |
| Chief commercial officer | CCO | They provide commercial strategy and development for a company |
| Chief communications officer | CCO | They communicate with the company’s employees, shareholders, media, bloggers, influencers, etc. and bring a balance to the business operation |
| Chief compliance officer | CCO | They oversee and manage regulatory compliance |
| Chief content officer | CCO | They create content for broadcasting channels and multimedia exploitation |
| Chief creative officer | CCO | They are responsible for the marketing, media, and branding of a company |
| Chief customer officer | CCO | Their main responsibility is to maintain the customer relationship |
| Chief data officer | CDO | They are responsible for data processing, data analysis, data mining, information trading, etc. |
| Chief delivery officer | CDO | They coordinate various parts of a project to ensure the project reaches its goal as well as delivers products worldwide |
| Chief design officer | CDO | Design all the products of a company as well as give insights into possible aspects of advertising, marketing, and engineering |
| Chief development officer | CDO | They are responsible for the development of a business |
| Chief digital officer | CDO | They introduce various digital technologies to a company |
| Chief diversity officer | CDO | They are responsible for diversity and inclusion |
| Chief engineering officer | CEO | Their main duty is to identify manufacturing issues and reduce the production cost |
| Chief executive officer | CEO | They are responsible for the overall vision and direction of an organization, |
| Chief experience officer | CEO | They are responsible for the user experience design of a company and maintaining a high user experience |
| Chief financial officer | CFO | Look after all the financial aspects of a company |
| Chief gaming officer | CGO | The main responsibility of a CGO is to develop various games and create a marketing policy |
| Chief government relations officer | CGRO | They maintain all aspects of government relations and lobbying |
| Chief human resources officer | CHRO | The main duty is to take care of human resource management and industrial relations |
| Chief information officer | CIO | This role is very common in IT companies and the main responsibility is to take care of IT infrastructure |
| Chief information security officer | CIO | Responsible for information security |
| Chief information technology officer | CITO | Responsible for information technology |
| Chief innovation officer | CIO | Responsible for innovation |
| Chief investment officer | CIO | They are responsible for the asset liability management |
| Chief knowledge officer | CKO | They manage intellectual capital and knowledge management |
| Chief learning officer | CLO | They offer various learning and training programs |
| Chief legal officer | CLO | They identify legal issues as well as take care of corporate governance and business policy |
| Chief marketing officer | CMO | Their main job is marketing and it includes sales, management, distribution of products, etc. |
| Chief medical officer | CMO | This role is very common in pharmaceutical companies, health systems, hospitals, etc. |
| Chief networking officer | CNO | They maintain proper networking between the company and its partners |
| Chief nursing officer | CNO | Responsible for nursing |
| Chief operating officer | COO | They supervise office administration as well as business operations |
| Chief privacy officer | CPO | They create and implement privacy policy within a company and maintain the privacy of the information of a company |
| Chief process officer | CPO | They are responsible for business processes, applied process theory, guidelines, etc. |
| Chief procurement officer | CPO | They are responsible for sourcing goods and services and negotiating prices and contracts |
| Chief product officer | CPO | They are responsible for all types of product-related matters including product vision, product strategy, user experience, product design, development, and marketing |
| Chief quality officer | CQO | They are responsible for the quality and quality assurance |
| Chief research officer | CRO | Responsible for research |
| Chief research and development officer | CRDO | Responsible for research and development |
| Chief revenue officer | CRO | They measure and maximize revenue |
| Chief risk officer | CRO | They manage the risk factors of a company |
| Chief sales officer | CSO | They are responsible for sales |
| Chief science officer | CSO | They are responsible for applied science, research, and development of new technologies |
| Chief security officer | CSO | They are responsible for both physical and networking security |
| Chief software officer | CSO | Responsible for the overall software strategy |
| Chief solutions officer | CSO | They are responsible for providing various solutions for a company |
| Chief strategy officer | CSO | They provide various strategic planning solutions like portfolio management, etc. |
| Chief sustainability officer | CSO | Responsible for sustainability programs |
| Chief system engineer | CSO | They look after the whole system of a company including system specification, validation, and verification |
| Chief technical officer | CTO | Look after all the technical aspects of an organization |
| Chief technology officer | CTO | They are responsible for technology, research, and development |
| Chief value officer | CVO | They ensure all the projects of a company capture customer value |
| Chief visionary officer | CVO | They are responsible for the business strategy, and working plans of a company |
| Chief web officer | CWO | Responsible for the web presence of the company |
State-wise Average Salary of CEO in the USA
| Name of the State | Average Salary |
| Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming | 212,000 USD 187,000 USD 224,000 USD 210,000 USD 241,000 USD 220,000 USD 215,000 USD 202,000 USD 199,000 USD 250,000 USD 248,000 USD 193,000 USD 195,000 USD 233,000 USD 224,000 USD 209,000 USD 211,000 USD 219,000 USD 221,000 USD 206,000 USD 234,000 USD 236,000 USD 224,000 USD 214,000 USD 203,000 USD 220,000 USD 196,000 USD 204,000 USD 211,000 USD 204,000 USD 239,000 USD 214,000 USD 252,000 USD 224,000 USD 184,000 USD 230,000 USD 211,000 USD 213,000 USD 239,000 USD 197,000 USD 223,000 USD 201,000 USD 236,000 USD 254,000 USD 218,000 USD 184,000 USD 226,000 USD 226,000 USD 202,000 USD 223,000 USD 191,000 USD |
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_title
http://www.salaryexplorer.com/salary-survey.php?loc=229&loctype=1&job=309&jobtype=3
Last Updated on September 1, 2022 by Ana S. Sutterfield
