Rakesh Khurana Quotes (5 Quotes)

Even if you have a person with the same sorts of qualities of Steve Jobs, the company is never going to be as animated or as authentic as it was when you had the founder running it.

To say that Citibank has had more than its share of problems would be an understatement. In May, for instance, the bank agreed on a 2.65 billion settlement with investors who bought stock and bonds in WorldCom before it filed for bankruptcy. Later that month, the Federal Reserve fined the bank 70 million for abuses in personal and mortgage loans to low-income and high-risk borrowers. In June, Citigroup suspended two executives in China, citing them for presenting false financial information to Chinese regulators and to the bank itself. In August, British regulators began an investigation of a 13.5 billion bond trade that was executed by Citigroup. Then, in September, Japan ordered Citigroup to close its private banking unit there for, among other things, failing to guard against money laundering. That was apparently the last straw for CEO Charles Prince. After a very public apology to the Japanese people, Prince set about on a daunting task -- changing the corporate culture of the financial giant. Is it possible Yes, ... But it's not probable. There's very little meaningful change that can go on in an organization because of past investments, taken-for-granted assumptions, vested interests in the status quo, inertia and other deeply rooted factors.

The period when Steve Jobs was not there was one of the most difficult periods in the company's history. When he returned, he set Apple back on a positive trajectory again.

As we are increasingly shifting to a post-industrial society, the kinds of environmental changes in business are as profound or even more profound as those in the 1960s, ... There will be significant shifts again Joel has a great opportunity to really elevate the visibility of SOM that hadn't been there before.

Who says CEOs don't suffer along with the rest of us As his company's stock slid 71 percent last year, one corporate chief saw his compensation fall 12 percent. But at least Dennis Kozlowski set a better example than the top-paid executive, who pulled in a whopping 136 million. That was Mark Swartz, his former CFO. It's sort of like the Golden Rule gone wrong, ... CEOs do unto others as they would have them do unto them.