联席CEO大多以失败告终，甲骨文这次会成为例外吗？

    1998年到2000年，桑迪•威尔和约翰•里德曾在花旗集团（Citigroup）担任联席CEO，后来二人也是反目成仇。沃顿商学院（Wharton）管理学荣誉教授劳伦斯•贺比尼亚克表示，在决定公司发展方向的问题上，两位CEO都是“有着强硬观点的强势领导人，因此‘两驾马车’的领导架构对他们的效果并不好。”

    在SAP公司，吉姆•斯内布和比尔•麦克德莫特也曾共同治理这家公司三年半的时间。在此期间，SAP斥140亿美元巨资大举进行收购，同期SAP的股价也增长了70%之外。但也正是在同一时期，SAP开始在云计算专家Salesforce.com的面前丢城失地。2013年斯内布辞去CEO职务，完全将权力交给麦克德莫特，他本人称，自己需要“开始职业生涯的下一个阶段，多陪家人。”

    Chipotle目前由两位CEO史蒂夫•埃尔斯和蒙蒂•莫兰共同执掌。Chipotle也是餐饮界近年来冉冉升起的少数明星企业之一。但它的领导层也引起了一些批评，尤其是两位CEO的成本问题。今年五月，该公司77%的股东投票反对高管薪酬方案。

    广告巨头阳狮集团（Publicis）和宏盟集团（Omnicom）合并失败，使双方共建全球最大广告公司的雄心化作泡影，其中一个重要的原因就是两位CEO个性不合。

    不过，联席CEO合作愉快的例子还是有一些的。

    KKR公司三位创始人中的两人，亨利•克拉维斯和乔治•罗伯茨，是表兄弟，他们并肩执掌这家知名的企业收购公司已经几十年了。

    在过去4年，约翰•麦基和沃特•罗伯两人一直共同执掌全食公司。麦基于1980年参与创办了全食公司，而罗伯于1991年加入，次年全食公司正式上市。罗伯于2010年被任命为全食的联合CEO。从那时起，全食公司继续保持了火箭般的扩张速度，股价也从每股13.73美元升至现在的39美元（去年最高时曾一度达到63.13美元）。

    在联席CEO架构下，创业公司Birchbox（主要卖美容产品样品）和眼镜零售商Warby Parker公司分别成功融资7190万美元和1.155亿美元。

    在联席CEO架构实行得比较成功的公司中，有一点是不约而同的——那就是两名CEO中至少有一人是公司创始人。贺比尼亚克表示：“一般来说，如果涉及几个人，那么他们必须有互相补充的技能或资本，必须愿意互相共事，认识到对方在某些领域的特长，并且在这些领域要向对方让步。”与那些之前没有一起共事过就“空降”到联合CEO岗位上的人相比，企业创始人一般更能满足这几个条件。

    格里尔表示，根据她的研究显示，两位联席CEO之间在各方面越平等，越有助于消弥他们的权力斗争。这种平等大到地位和特权，小到薪水和办公室的大小。

    卡茨和赫德的薪水待遇显然是很不错的——两人的底薪都是95万美元，2013年，两人从公司领走的总薪酬都是4400万美元左右。在贺比尼亚克看来，虽然两位CEO都不是甲骨文的创始人，但他们在过去四年里一直维系着彼此的平衡，各自在相反但又相关的领域开拓。卡茨主要负责公司的内部财务、法务和生产事宜，而赫德主要负责销售和服务等外部事宜。

    甲骨文此次安排的幕后推手正是埃里森本人，他决定“退而不休”，继续担任甲骨文首席技术官的角色。《财富》（Fortune）杂志的亚当•拉辛斯基认为，甲骨文的此次管理层洗牌很大程度上是作了一场秀。“上周四甲骨文传来拉里•埃里森卸任CEO的重磅消息，然而最令人震惊的事实却是，此次管理层的调整对甲骨文的影响其实非常小。”

    贺比尼亚克也认同这种观点：“这是一出三个人演的戏。我们应该怎样叫它？三部曲吗？”

    甲骨文最好早点找出解决方案来。有两个CEO就够麻烦了，更惶论有三个。（财富中文网）

    译者：朴成奎

    Sandy Weill and John Reed, co-CEOs at Citigroup from 1998 to 2000, clashed, says Lawrence Hrebiniak, professor emeritus of management at Wharton, since they were both “strong people with strong views” when it came to determining the company’s direction. “In that case, the duality didn’t really do them very good.”

    At SAP, Jim Snabe and Bill McDermott ran the company jointly for three-and-a-half years when it spent more than $14 billion on acquisitions and saw the company’s stock price increase by 70%. The company also lost ground to cloud specialist Salesforce.com during that same timeframe. Snabe ceded power to his counterpart in 2013, citing the need to “begin the next phase of my career, closer to my family.”

    Chipotle is run by two executives, Steve Ells and Monty Moran, and it’s been one of the few stars of the restaurant world of late. But its leadership—specifically the cost of operating under two CEOs—drew scrutiny in May when 77% of shareholders voted against its executive pay plan.

    Publicis and Omnicom pulled the plug on a merger that would have created the world’s largest advertising company in large part because of a clash of CEO egos.

    And then there are other times, when co-CEOs operate relatively seamlessly.

    Cousins Henry Kravis and George Roberts—two of the three founders of KKR—have overseen the best-known corporate buy-out company side-by-side for decades.

    For the last four years, CEOs John Mackey and Walter Robb have run Whole Foods. Mackey co-founded Whole Foods in 1980 and Robb joined in 1991, a year before the company went public. Robb was named co-CEO alongside Mackey in 2010. Since then, Whole Foods has continued its rapid-fire expansion and seen its stock price increase from $13.73 per share to $39 now, (though that’s down from a high of $63.13 last year.)

    Under co-CEOs, start-up Birchbox, which sells monthly subscriptions to beauty samples, and eyewear company Warby Parker have raised $71.9 million and $115.5 million, respectively.

    The common thread in these successful examples is that one—if not both—CEOs founded the company. “Generally, when multiple people are involved, they must have complementary skills or assets, they must be willing to work together, recognize the other’s expertise in areas, and give in to the other based on that expertise,” Hrebiniak says. People who built a business from the bottom up can tick more of those boxes than two individuals who are thrown into a shared leadership role without an existing side-by-side relationship.

    Based on her research, Greer says that power struggles can be defused when co-leaders are as equal as they can be in terms of status and privilege, down to their salary and office size.

    Catz and Hurd are certainly well compensated—both earned a base salary of $950,000 and racked in total compensation of about $44 million in 2013. And, to Hrebiniak’s point, though the two new CEOs don’t have a founders’ connection, they’ve managed to balance each other out for the past four years, carving out opposite but correlative niches. Catz focuses on internal finance, legal, and manufacturing matters, while Hurd handle outside affairs, like sales and service.

    The wild card in this arrangement is Ellison, who has opted to take on a role as chief technology officer at Oracle. Fortune’s Adam Lashinksyargues that Thursday’s management shuffle was largely for show. “The most shocking thing about Thursday’s bombshell announcement that Larry Ellison is stepping down as CEO of Oracle is how little will change,” he wrote.

    Hrebiniak agrees. “Three people are running the show. What do we call that? A trilogy?” he says.

    Oracle better figure this all out soon. Having two CEOs is tough. The only thing that might be worse is having three.