Did you know that the average S&P 500 CEO makes nearly $20 million per year? Did you know that these same CEOs are making almost 300 percent as much as their average employee?
There’s a market to be tapped here, and it’s high time someone did it.
Hi, I’m Ben R. Williams, and I’m formally announcing my availability as an affordable CEO for YOUR high-profile corporation!
Now look, I get it: you’re on the board of a powerful company and you wanted to bring in the very best CEO that money can buy, so you paid a pile of cash to some clean-cut old white dude in a $10,000 suit to sit in a chair and look out a window all day. Sure, everybody’s doing it, but isn’t it time for a better way?
I may not have a history of running companies, but if you make me the CEO of your company, I can make you two iron-clad guarantees:
Guarantee 1: I will only charge you a one-time fee of $50,000. I have never seen $50,000 in one place before so this will be very exciting for me.
Guarantee 2: There is absolutely nothing that the average CEO can do that I cannot also do.
Don’t believe me? Consider the following: Elon Musk has made literally tens of billions of dollars running Tesla. You know who else can come up with an idea for a hideous truck that rusts overnight and gets totaled if it drives through a deep puddle? That’s right, me. Give me a 12-pack of beer and a sketch pad and I’ll bang out two ugly death trucks in a weekend for you. You can take that to the bank!
Dave Calhoun received $33 million in stock awards last year for being the CEO of Boeing, a position he’s held since 2020. You know who else can ruin the reputation of a once-respected aeronautics corporation? That’s right, me. And I bet I can do it in less than four years if I put my back into it.
If you select me as your next CEO, I stand by the following iron-clad promises (not to be confused with the iron-clad guarantees):
Promise 1: I will not require a golden parachute in the event that I’m let go. Why do these CEOs always get paid handsomely after ruining a company? That’s not a rhetorical question, I genuinely don’t understand why that happens.
Promise 2: I WILL wear a suit if requested. It will be purchased from my favorite haberdashery, Suit City. I will buy two suits if they are running a sale. Once I’m wearing the suit, you can take a photo of me while I do my best to look important, and then you can post that photo on your website or whatever.
Promise 3: If someone attempts to save the lives of children who are trapped in a cave, I will NOT call him a pedophile on Twitter. In fact, the only thing I will post on Twitter is that your company is doing great work and I’m proud to be its CEO. Elon Musk has proven that airing your toxic opinions on social media is a good way to get people to hate your product; in contrast, I will be a bland blank slate that occasionally uses the word “synergy.”
Promise 4: I will NOT actually do anything unless specifically asked. Nothing does more damage to a company than a CEO with an exciting new idea; I will not be bringing any of these to the table. Just tell everybody I said to keep up the good work.
“But Ben,” you ask, “all of this sounds great, but how do you plan to make ends meet with a flat rate of just $50,000?”
That’s easy: I’m in the volume business. Based on my analysis, I believe I can serve as the acting CEO of anywhere from 2 to 2,500 companies simultaneously, as long as they don’t mind if I’m wearing the same suit in another company’s website photo. As your discount CEO, your board and employees will be relieved to know that I’m not going to be in the office every day micromanaging every little decision and embarrassing you on the national stage. In fact, I won’t ever be in the office at all. But everyone can take comfort in the fact that somewhere, there’s a distant, aloof figure with a hand on the tiller.
That reminds me, I’m also announcing my availability as a discount religious deity.
