Glassdoor keeps tabs on employee impressions of management and work conditions at major companies. The survey site has more than one million users who review over 70,000 firms. These companies represent all industries, 100% of the Dow Jones Industrials, and 98% of the Fortune 500.
Glassdoor recently completed a survey which creates what it calls its “CEO Watch List”. It is not surprising that among the firms with detested CEOs are operations that have a history of bad management, layoffs, and investor frustration. Many of the companies also get low marks from the Glassdor corporate rating system.
Dillard’s (NYSE:DDS) has had a history of same store sales declines and layoffs. CEO Bill Dillard II is disliked by his employees. So is Glenn Tilton of United (NASDAQ:UAUA) and Julian Day at Radio Shack (NYSE:RSH), another faltering retailer. In the same category, W. Bruce Johnson at Sears (NASDAQ: SHLD) is held in remarkably low esteem.
The top of the list is filled with companies that have had long successful runs as business and are often led by inspirational CEOs; Steve Jobs at Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Gary Kelly at Southwest (NYSE:LUV), and Eric Schmidt at Google (NASDAQ:GOOG). The biggest surprise at the top end of the highest rated CEO list is Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS). He does make his employees a lot of money.
The rest of the list:
| Company | Company Rating | CEO | CEO Approval Rating | Lowest Rated Company |
| Frost & Sullivan | 2.2 | Krishna Srinivasan | 3% | |
| LexisNexis | 2.3 | Andy Prozes | 7% | Yes |
| Xilinx | 2.2 | Moshe Gavrielov | 10% | Yes |
| United Airlines | 2.0 | Glenn F. Tilton | 11% | Yes |
| Rain Bird | 2.2 | Anthony LaFetra | 11% | Yes |
| CSAA Inter-Insurance Bureau | 2.4 | James R. Pouliot | 11% | |
| Nortel Networks | 2.8 | Mike S. Zafirovski | 11% | |
| Dillard’s | 2.3 | Bill Dillard II | 12% | |
| Delphi | 2.7 | Rodney O’Neal | 13% | |
| RadioShack | 2.3 | Julian C. Day | 14% | Yes |
| Level 3 Communications | 2.3 | Jim Crowe | 14% | Yes |
| Gibson Guitar | 1.9 | Henry E. Juszkiewicz | 14% | Yes |
| Panduit | 2.4 | Jack Caveney | 15% | Yes |
| Affiliated Computer Services | 2.3 | Lynn R. Blodgett | 15% | Yes |
| Spherion | 2.2 | Roy G. Krause | 16% | Yes |
| Corporate Executive Board | 2.6 | Thomas L. Monahan III | 18% | |
| Kimberly-Clark | 2.8 | Tom Falk | 18% | |
| Sears | 2.7 | W. Bruce Johnson | 18% | |
| Rite Aid | 2.5 | Mary F. Sammons | 19% | |
| Gannett | 2.6 | Craig A. Dubow | 19% | |
| Pfizer | 3.0 | Jeff Kindler | 19% | |
| eBay | 2.8 | John J. Donahoe | 20% | |
| Sun Microsystems | 3.2 | Jonathan I. Schwartz | 20% | |
| Office Depot | 2.7 | Steve Odland | 20% | |
| Amgen | 3.1 | Kevin W. Sharer | 20% | |
| Glassdoor Report: Highest Rated CEOs as of 1/1/10 | ||||
| Company | Company Rating | CEO | CEO Approval Rating | Best Place to Work |
| General Mills | 4.4 | Ken Powell | 96% | Yes |
| Southwest Airlines | 4.7 | Gary C. Kelly | 94% | Yes |
| Apple | 3.8 | Steve Jobs | 91% | Yes |
| Northwestern Mutual | 4.0 | Edward J. Zore | 90% | Yes |
| Procter & Gamble | 4.0 | A.G. Lafley | 87% | Yes |
| Goldman Sachs | 3.8 | Lloyd C. Blankfein | 86% | Yes |
| 3.9 | Eric E. Schmidt | 86% | Yes | |
| BlackRock | 3.3 | Laurence D. Fink | 84% | |
| CareerBuilder | 3.8 | Matt Ferguson | 82% | Yes |
| FactSet | 3.8 | Philip A. Hadley | 81% | |
| Chevron | 3.9 | Dave O’Reilly | 80% | Yes |
| Edelman | 3.7 | Richard W. Edelman | 80% | Yes |
| Rackspace | 3.9 | A. Lanham Napier | 79% | Yes |
| Overstock.com | 4.0 | Patrick M. Byrne | 79% | |
| Marriott | 3.7 | Bill Marriott Jr. | 78% | Yes |
| Scottrade | 3.7 | Rodger O. Riney | 78% | Yes |
| USAA | 3.5 | Joe Robles Jr. | 77% | |
| Edward Jones | 3.8 | Jim Weddle | 77% | Yes |
| National Instruments | 3.7 | James J. Truchard | 76% | Yes |
| Schlumberger | 3.6 | Andrew Gould | 75% | Yes |
| Costco Wholesale | 3.5 | Jim Sinegal | 75% | |
| Netflix | 3.5 | Reed Hastings | 75% | |
| Caterpillar | 3.6 | Jim Owens | 74% | Yes |
| salesforce.com | 3.6 | Marc Benioff | 73% | |
| Citrix Systems | 3.6 | Mark B. Templeton | 73% | |
Douglas A. McIntyre
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