Eight times global CEOs stirred up controversies with their statements

The tattoed CEO of Twitter found himself in not one but two controversies recently. Jack Dorsey’s visit to India raised quite a storm when a picture shared by a journalist showed the CEO standing with a poster which read ‘Smash Brahminical Patriarchy’ during an interaction with journalists and activists in India. Twitter, on its part, stressed that it was apolitical and apologised for the photograph, stating that it was a private photo as a gift and not reflective of the company’s views.
Dorsey landed in another soup recently when, after attending a 10 day Vipassana camp in Myanmar, he spoke highly about the country in a series of tweets and promoted it as a tourist destination. While glorifying Myanmar and its ‘people full of joy and amazing food,’ Dorsey did not mention the Rohingya crisis even once.
His tweets were widely condemned for failing to speak about the violence against the Rohingya community who have been forced to flee from the country over the last few years. Adding to the controversy is the fact that a large part of the violence was weaponised by social media.

Image credit: By cellanr – https://www.flickr.com/photos/rorycellan/21834269682/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=43890931

The CEO of the Irish low-cost airline Ryanair, Michael O’Leary has often been at the receiving end of critics for his insensitive remarks. He has also been described by the media as an ‘arrogant and prone to making statements which he later contradicts’. One of his most bizarre and controversial remarks remain, “You’re not getting a refund so f*** off. We don’t want to hear your sob stories. What part of ‘no refund’ don’t you understand?”
Despite being one of Ireland’s wealthiest businessmen, O’Leary had also said that he was Europe’s most underpaid CEO and that he was paid only around 20 times more than the average RyanAir employee, though the pay gap should be higher.

Image credit: By World Travel & Tourism Council – Michael O’Leary, CEO, Ryanair, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=39746195

The CEO is known more for trying to keep Microsoft relevant and for his thoughtfulness and emotionality than for making brazen remarks. However, India-born Satya Nadella has not been completely devoid of controversies.
Speaking about the gender gap in pay, Nadella had said that women should trust ‘karma’ instead of asking for a pay hike. He added that women working in the IT industry must have trust in the system and that it will give the right raises as you go along.
His remarks caused quite a stir on Twitter with many lambasting him. Nadella than tweeted saying,” Was inarticulate re how women should ask for raise. Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias.”
Image credit: By Maurizio Pesce – https://www.flickr.com/photos/pestoverde/16928752317/, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42249062

Co-founder of Uber and Red Swoosh and former CEO of Uber Travis Kalanick’s fall from grace was quite a phenomenal one. While Kalanick was already under pressure for mishandling sexual harassment charges, a video surfaced in early 2017, showing him arguing with an Uber driver who had told him that the pay rates for drivers had fallen and that people did not trust him any more. Kalanick had replied saying, “Some people don’t like to take responsibility for their own s**t. They blame everything in their life on somebody else. Good luck!”
After the video caused a stir, Kalanick apologised on the Uber blog and said that it was time for him to ‘grow up’ and get help.

Image credit: By GES Photo – https://www.flickr.com/photos/ges2016/27251624604/, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=70789799

The eccentric CEO of Tesla and SpaceX is definitely one of controversy’s favourite children. During the daring rescue of 12 kids from the cave in Thailand where they had been trapped in end June, early July this year, British diver Vern Unsworth had called Musk’s offer to help a ‘PR stunt, ‘ adding that the miniature submarine that Musk had designed and sent would be ineffective. Musk shot back calling the diver a ‘pedo guy’ on Twitter. While he later apologised for his tweet, he did not let it go. Musk tweeted once more, this time asking “You don’t think it’s strange he hasn’t sued me?”
Unsworth sued Musk for libel and slander, asking atleast USD 75,000 in compensatory damages. He also sought an injunction against Musk which required him to “refrain from making further publication of the False and Defamatory Accusations,” as per the court documents.
During an open earnings conference call with Wallstreet analysts in May this year, Musk discredited the analysts, when he was faced by a series of probing financial questions. He said, “Boring bonehead questions are not cool. Next.” Musk reportedly even told one of the analysts, “We have no interest in satisfying the desires of day traders. I couldn’t care less. Please sell our stock and don’t buy it.” Tesla stock prices fell after the conference call.
Image credit: By Steve Jurvetson from Menlo Park, USA – Elon Musk at TED 2017, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=72830002

Among the most controversial of American CEOs, the former head honcho of clothing giant Abercombie and Fitch has made quite a few sexually and racially insensitive comments. Speaking about what his brand represented, Jeffries had said, “People said we were cynical, that we were sexualizing little girls. But you know what? I still think those are cute underwear for little girls. And I think anybody who gets on a bandwagon about thongs for little girls is crazy. Just crazy! There’s so much craziness about sex in this country. It’s nuts! I can see getting upset about letting your girl hang out with a bunch of old pervs, but why would you let your girl hang out with a bunch of old pervs?”
Image credit: Twitter

From privacy issues and internal political struggles to misusing user data, fake news and Russian meddling CEO and co-founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg has enough and more on his plate. And his recent comments on the Holocaust denial have not helped him either.
During an interview with Recode, Zuckerberg had spoken about how, while Holocaust denial was wrong, it should be allowed to exist on Facebook. He had said, “I’m Jewish, and there’s a set of people who deny that the Holocaust happened. I find that deeply offensive. But at the end of the day, I don’t believe that our platform should take that down because I think there are things that different people get wrong.” Zuckerberg faced a major backlash for his comments which were taken as insensitive. He later apologised for it.

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The CEO of Qatar Airways was accused of being sexist when he suggested that only a man could do his role as the CEO of an aviation company. The statement was made just as he had been appointed as Chairman of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) for a year, in June this year. When he was asked what could be done to tackle the lack of women in the aviation industry in the Middle East, Al Baker said that it was not the case with Qatar Airways, but added about his job, “Of course, it has to be led by a man, because it is a very challenging position.”
He issued an apology after being criticised for his sexist remark.
Image credit: By World Economic Forum from Cologny, Switzerland – Akbar Al Baker, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5993334