What does CEO mean?
CEO stands for Chief Executive Officer and is the English term for the main managing director or for persons who assume the function of managing the company.
Differences between a CEO and a managing director
Nowadays, the English term is often used in the job titles of Swiss companies, either because of the company’s international relations or simply because it has become common practice to use English terms.
However, there are legal differences between a CEO and a managing director compared to the use of the term in Anglo-Saxon countries:
- For managing directors of a Swiss company, “CEO” is only an additional designation – in legal terms (with regard to commercial and company law), however, the term has no relevance.
- In Swiss companies, the term CEO should therefore be understood as a job description rather than a title.
- While Swiss companies can have several managing directors and therefore several CEOs, the Anglo-Saxon understanding is that there is only one CEO in a company – the person at the top of the company.
A look at how the term CEO is used around the world shows that it is understood differently depending on the culture. For example, people at lower hierarchical levels also have this title, often at the same level as similarly designated positions such as CFO – Chief Financial Officer.
Tasks of the CEO
In Anglo-Saxon companies, the CEO is the highest-ranking managerial position. Associated with this are:
- Main responsibility for all business decisions
- Representative of the company
- Link between the most important bodies of the company
- Monitoring the various functions of the company
However, what exactly a CEO does in a company depends heavily on the company structure and size. In a very large company, the CEO is primarily responsible for the strategic direction of the company, whereas in smaller companies the CEO generally takes on more practical tasks.