Another year, another endless news cycle driven by the
While some CEOs seemed to relish the spotlight, Elon Musk chief among them, others were inadvertently thrust into
Here are some of the most high-profile management misadventures:
The Muskiest moment
Of all the jaw-dropping Musk moments this year, the pinnacle came on stage at the New York Times DealBook Summit when he told advertisers that have stopped spending on X to go "f— themselves. "Hey Bob, if you're in the audience" he added, calling out Bob Iger, the CEO of Walt Disney — one company among many that distanced itself after Musk endorsed an
Still, if advertisers leave X, the platform's failure will be their fault, not his, Musk said, calling their retreat a form of blackmail. He said he won't "tap dance" to prove he's trustworthy.
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Billionaire cage match bluff
In June, Musk challenged Mark Zuckerberg to what perhaps passes for a duel in 2023, posting on X: "I'm up for a cage match if he is lol." The peculiar invitation came shortly after news surfaced that Meta Platforms was set to release Threads as a competitor to X.
Zuckerberg, who practices Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, readily agreed. Musk advertised a showdown in Vegas in August, and then started a rumor it might actually be staged in the Colosseum in Rome, which Italy's culture minister promptly debunked. But Musk began making excuses as the summer weeks slid by, saying he might need surgery for his neck/back/shoulder. Zuckerberg eventually called his bluff, saying it was "time to move on."
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OpenAI's about-face
The abrupt firing and rehiring of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman by the board played out over the course of a long weekend. The whole thing was pretty bizarre, with some of the drama unfolding on social media. Between angry investors and employees, virtually all of whom threatened to quit, the board beat a hasty retreat.
As rumors swirled that he might return, Altman posted a photo of himself at the San Francisco office wearing a guest badge: "first and last time i ever wear one of these." In an especially strange twist, one of the ouster's leaders, OpenAI co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, later
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Pre-pink slip digital detox
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff says he took a 10-day trip to French Polynesia for a so-called digital detox ahead of the company's mass layoff of about 8,000 staff. A digital detox is when someone forgoes phones or computers for a period of time to feel more present and less dependent on technology and social media.
In a letter to employees at the time, Benioff said the company hired too many workers during the pandemic, which he took responsibility for. But Benioff also appeared tone-deaf, arriving late to a meeting the day after the layoff, joking, "did I miss something?" Some pointed out the irony of the sudden job cuts next to Benioff's frequent characterization of the company as an Ohana, a Hawaiian term for family.
