The 10 Most Valuable Brands and the CEOs Behind Them: Part 1

Most of us have heard of these big brands and are familiar with a lot of the names at the top of them. We decided to look a little further and see where the people calling the shots paid their educational dues. Here is what we found:

1. Apple- Steve Jobs attended Reed College in Portland Oregon. He dropped out after only one semester but continued to audit classes at the schoolincluding one on calligraphy. He has later stated, “If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would havenever had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them.”

2. Google- Larry Page is the current CEO and one of the co-founders of Google. He first attended the University of Michigan where he earned his Bachelor of Science in computer engineering. He then went on to obtain a Master’s degree in computer science from Stanford. He then enrolled in Stanford University’s Ph.D. program where he completed his dissertation on the mathematical properties of the internet. While attending a spring orientation of new computer Ph.D. candidates, Larry met Sergey Brin.Together they founded Google.

3. IBM- Saumel J. Palmisano has served as CEO of IBM since March 2002. He attended John Hopkins University where he earned a bachelor’s degree in history. He was also a member of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity and a promising athlete. He turned down an opportunity to try out for the Oakland Raiders. In 1973 he joined IBM as a salesman. It is also interesting to note that he once played back up saxophone for The Temptations.

4. McDonald’s- Jim Skinner CEO. Jim got his start at McDonald’s as a restaurant manager trainee in a small town in Illinois and worked his way up from there. He never graduated from college, however, he did serve for ten years in the United States Navy.

5. Microsoft- Steve Ballmer definitely paid his dues when it comes to education. He attended Harvard University where he earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and economics. He graduated magna cum laude. Not only did he keep up on his grades, but be managed the football team and worked on both The Harvard Crimson Newspaper and the Harvard Advocate. While at Harvard, he lived just down the hall from Bill Gates. Steve later went on to attend the Stanford University Graduate School of Business but dropped out to join Microsoft.

To be continued…

The 10 Most Valuable Brands and the CEOs Behind Them: Part 2