How to Measure Personal Brand of a Business CEO

Abstract

A Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is the final decision maker of an enterprise and is the central figure influencing the culture of that enterprise. A CEO has a personal brand, which in collusion with a corporation’s business brand casts a halo effect upon clients, customers, and employees, both present and potential. To date, most of the research on personal brands has been restricted to discussions over methods of building up personal brands: there has been no definitive research towards the construction of an evaluative scale of business CEO personal brands. Our current research has developed just such a scale, using seven evaluative dimensions to measure the work standards, competency, charisma, personality, values, character, and leadership qualities of a CEO. This unique scale enables users to clearly distinguish the personal brand of a business CEO. Researchers such as Bennis and O’Toole (2000) have suggested that boards of directors need to find more effective means of selecting their CEOs [1]. We believe that our scale can and should assist boards of directors faced with the question of whether a CEO’s personal brand meets the expectations of their enterprise.