Credit: Inside the MagicBob Iger and Elon Musk may be business magnate rivals on a global scale, but their fellow CEOs have one word for them: overrated.
In the last year, Bob Iger and Elon Musk unexpectedly came into conflict when the Tesla CEO publicly cursed out the the Disney CEO DealBook Summit 2023, accusing Disney (along with a number of other businesses) of “blackmailing” Twitter by pulling their advertising from the social media platform.
Musk told a shocked crowd, “Don’t advertise…Somebody’s going to try to blackmail me with advertising?! Blackmail me with money? Go f*** yourself. Go. F***. Yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is… Hey, Bob [Iger], if you’re here in the audience. Sorry, that’s how I feel.”
Related: Former Disney Chief Says Bob Iger “Systemically” Sabotaged Future of Company
Elon Musk’s characteristically vulgar outburst kicked off a wave of animosity toward the Walt Disney Company, with many Twitter users calling for a boycott of the media company and Musk agreeing that Star Wars fans should sue it for hiring a “woke” female director.
It is somewhat striking to see Bob Iger and Elon Musk once again paired up, this time because the Disney CEO and the South African billionaire have been ranked as the most overrated CEOs by nearly 400 of their peers on Fortune‘s annual list of most admired companies.
For the second year in a row, Elon Musk has topped the list as the most overrated CEO in the world. This year, it is likely because of the massive devaluation of Twitter since he purchased it for a reported $40 billion, his increasing alliances and admiration of controversial far-right figures, and the perception that his much-vaunted plans to create fully autonomous cars, colonize Mars, and develop advanced AI might be more of pipe dreams than concrete business plans.
Related: Disney’s Bob Iger Named One of 2023’s Biggest “Villains” in Scathing Report
On the other hand, the Disney CEO dropped all the way down to number two on the list after over a decade of the company being on the top 10 All-Stars list. Undoubtedly, much of that has to do with Disney’s diminished fortunes in the last year; in 2023, Disney was a main player in a highly public and vicious Hollywood strike and saw a staggering number of box office flops (including the slow-motion implosion of the Marvel Cinematic Universe).
Bob Iger himself was recently viewed as a legendary Disney CEO who vastly expanded the footprint of Walt Disney World and the company’s catalog of iconic stories, but things aren’t looking too great for him if he’s being compared to Elon Musk so quickly.
Do you think either the Tesla or Disney CEO is overrated? Tell us why in the comments below!