Leadership
Andy Jassy, Satya Nadella, among 43% of CEOs' staff say they deserve a PIP
43% of CEOs—including Andy Jassy, Satya Nadella & Marc Benioff—would face PIPs if judged like employees, says Blind survey.
What if the world’s most powerful CEOs were judged by the same standards as their employees? According to a new Blind workplace survey, nearly 43% of CEOs—including Andy Jassy (Amazon), Satya Nadella (Microsoft), Marc Benioff (Salesforce), Glenn Fogel (Booking.com), Jack Dorsey (Block), Mike Cannon-Brookes (Atlassian), Evan Spiegel (Snap), Cristiano Amon (Qualcomm), Alex Chriss (PayPal), and Hisayuki “Deko” Idekoba (Indeed) would be slapped with a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP).
And here’s the kicker: this comes even as their companies’ market valuations jumped 16% in Q2 2025.
CEOs graded like employees: 40% rated ‘Unsatisfactory’
The survey revealed that 40% of CEOs received the lowest rating of “Unsatisfactory”, a grade that in most workplaces would trigger a PIP. Another chunk was marked “Needs Improvement.”
Decision-making quality (50%) was cited as the biggest reason for poor ratings, followed by company performance (31%).
When it came to sensitive HR decisions like layoffs and pay adjustments, only 10% of employees approved—while 67% said leadership failed.
Positive reviews for two CEOs
The evaluations revealed significant concerns: 83% of CEOs fell short of expectations. Only two stood out with positive reviews — Jensen Huang of NVIDIA earned the highest rating of Far Exceeds Expectations, and Hock Tan of Broadcom received Exceeds Expectations.
‘Too many bosses, not enough direction’
Employees also flagged bloated executive teams, with 44% saying leadership groups were too large for the company’s actual growth stage and workload.
One Microsoft employee, rating their CEO as “Unsatisfactory,” said, “Consistent mass layoffs crush morale and expose a short-sighted strategy prioritizing stock prices over long-term organizational and human health. It’s a lose-lose: the company loses good talent and ultimately devalues itself in the long term.”
At ByteDance, where the CEO earned a “Needs Improvement,” an employee quipped, “Feels like it’s mostly the junior folks doing the real work, while the executives take home the big salaries without contributing much. They’re just laying off junior people.”
Employees vs. investors: a growing divide
Despite scathing employee reviews, these companies’ market caps rose an average of 16% from Q1 to Q2 2025. The disconnect highlights how investors reward short-term gains, while employees judge leadership on culture, vision, and human impact.
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