Fortune released the results alongside its list of most admired companies, which was published Jan. 29.
For its list of most admired companies, analysts examined about 1,500 candidates: the 1,000 largest U.S. companies, ranked by revenue, along with non-U.S. companies in Fortune’s Global 500 database that earn revenue of at least $10 billion. They then narrowed candidates to the highest-revenue companies in each industry, a total of 650 in 30 countries.
Korn Ferry and Fortune then examined those 650 companies and surveyed more than 3,300 executives to measure reputation based on nine different attributes. As part of the process, executives could vote for the Fortune 500 CEOs who they feel are either overrated or underrated.
The most underrated Fortune 500 CEO, with 285 votes, is Satya Nadella, chairman and CEO of Microsoft, according to results shared with Becker’s. Mr. Nadella was rated the most underrated CEO for the ninth consecutive year — “having helped make Microsoft tenfold more valuable during his tenure, thanks to timely pivots to the cloud and AI,” Fortune noted. Mr. Nadella has led the company as CEO since 2014.
Other top votegetters for most underrated CEO were Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, at 143 votes, Doug McMillon, CEO of Walmart, at 119 votes, Ed Bastian, CEO of Delta, at 85 votes and Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, at 84 votes.
Fortune also sought guidance from executives on who, of their peers, may be overrated, with Tesla‘s Elon Musk securing that designation for the third consecutive year, with 455 votes. The CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and owner of X (formerly Twitter), whom President Donald Trump selected to oversee a team at the Department of Government Efficiency, is serving as a “special government employee,” the White House confirmed, according to The Washington Post.
Mr. Musk “has increased his prominence enormously by helping [President] Donald Trump win the presidency; his reputation as a leader may be seen as inflated, but his influence is unmatched,” according to Fortune.
Other top votegetters for most overrated were Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, at 326 votes, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta Platforms, at 200 votes, James Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, at 192 votes and Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, at 188 votes.
