What do Bill Gates, Hans Vestberg, John Thompson, John Donahoe, and Alan Mulally have in common? If you don\u2019t know, you\u2019re not alone, and if you don\u2019t follow these circles nobody would blame you. Throw in the name Steve Ballmer and something might ring a bell, but I won\u2019t keep you guessing.<\/p>\n
Steve Ballmer has been serving as Chief Executive Officer for Microsoft since June of 1980, and he has said he will be stepping down in 2014. This announcement came out early last year and was put out as \u201cin twelve months.\u201d That time period is growing short. No name has been publicly proclaimed as his successor, but the ones I listed in the first line are all in consideration\u2014yes, even Bill Gates.<\/p>\n
Actually, Alan Mulally has said he won\u2019t leave Ford, and there were a couple of others rumored to be on the short list, one from Ebay and one from Nokia. And Bill Gates has said he doesn\u2019t want a full-time role at the company, but he wouldn\u2019t rule out a bit more active participation.<\/p>\n
A lot of us figure this can\u2019t come too soon. In the past decade or more, Microsoft has been playing catch-up on every platform, and we were wondering how long Ballmer\u2019s days would be. \u00a0Too long for most of us. Microsoft makes good<\/i> products, they just haven\u2019t made innovative<\/i> products for a long time. (If you\u2019re an Apple fan, you\u2019re probably saying \u201cever.\u201d It\u2019s really not true, but Microsoft innovation goes back longer than a lot of Apple folks can remember.) It seems like a lot of today\u2019s computer users probably don\u2019t even remember when Ballmer took over at the helm.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a quick look at who these folks are:<\/p>\n
Bill Gates\u2014former CEO and founder of Microsoft; now out saving the world, very effectively; not surprising he\u2019s not eager to give that up.<\/p>\n
Hans Vesberg\u2014CEO of Ericsson<\/p>\n
John Thompson\u2014Board member for Microsoft; has expressly expressed DISinterest<\/p>\n
John Donahoe\u2014CEO of EBay<\/p>\n
Alan Mulally\u2014CEO of Ford\u2014has stated categorically that he is staying at Ford.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s hoping that under new leadership Microsoft will rise to what it could be. \u00a0And here\u2019s hoping I don\u2019t have to look at Ballmer much longer, because he always reminded me of Peter Boyle playing the monster in Young Frankenstein. I never could shake that association.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
What do Bill Gates, Hans Vestberg, John Thompson, John Donahoe, and Alan Mulally have in common? If you don\u2019t know, you\u2019re not alone, and if you don\u2019t follow these circles nobody would blame you. Throw in the name Steve Ballmer and something might ring a bell, but I won\u2019t keep you guessing. Steve Ballmer has…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[325,335,374,376,187],"class_list":["post-1321","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recentrelevant","tag-ballmer","tag-bill-gates","tag-ceo","tag-chairman","tag-microsoft"],"yoast_head":"\n