Have CEOs changed?

Here is a recent paper by Yann Decressin, Steven N. Kaplan, and Morten Sorensen:

Using more than 4,900 assessments, we study changes in the characteristics and objectives of CEOs and top executives since 2001. The same four factors explain roughly half of the variation of assessed CEO characteristics in this larger sample of executive assessments as in Kaplan and Sorensen (2021). After the global financial crisis (GFC), the average interviewed CEO candidate has lower overall ability, is more execution oriented / less interpersonal, less charismatic and less creative / strategic than pre-GFC. Except for overall ability, these differences persist in hired CEOs. Interpersonal or “softer” skills, if anything, decline over time for both CEO candidates and hired CEOs. Pre- and post-GFC, we find a positive correlation between the ability of assessed CEOs and other C-level executives assessed at the same company, suggesting that higher ability executives complement each other. Finally, we look at the relation of the objectives for which the CEOs are interviewed to CEO characteristics.

Via the excellent Kevin Lewis.