If the tech industry were a high school and we were voting on our Homecoming King, it looks like Mark Zuckerberg would come out on top. I mean, he’d also come out on the bottom, but just like in high school, the most popular people in school take a lot of flack too, right? According to a new study by polling company Morning Consult, Facebook’s CEO is not only the most well-known tech leader, but also the most favorably viewed. Results show that 48 percent of respondents to the survey quite liked the Zuck, and that only 31 percent had no opinion or had never heard of him.
The study, which took place on February 24 and 25, focused on American feelings towards the ongoing Apple and FBI encryption debate, spurred by officials’ demand to unlock the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone. Apple’s CEO Tim Cook has taken on the American government in a major way, refusing to budge on his dedication to protecting customers’ privacy, and is currently viewed as the second most popular CEO. 39 percent of the 1,935 survey respondents say they like Cook, and just behind him is Amazon’s leader, Jeff Bezos, with 38 percent.
Satya Nadella of Microsoft, Larry Page of Alphabet, and Elon Musk of Tesla were all favorably viewed by 29 percent of respondents, but falling behind these leaders were Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey (19 percent) and Uber’s CEO Travis Kalanick (16 percent). It’s also worth noting that this poll brings into sharp relief the fact that all of these major CEOs are men.
Though Zuckerberg was also the most unfavorably viewed of the CEOs (21 percent aren’t fans), Kalanick isn’t far behind — 19 percent of respondents don’t seem to care for the Uber leader, which is unsurprising given the company’s constant PR disasters and ongoing lawsuits and protests. People also seem wary of Uber as a company — only 18 percent of survey participants said they trusted Uber to keep their personal information safe.
For full results on how the leaders of Silicon Valley stack up against one another (and how the general populace feels about the encryption debate), check out the full results from Morning Consult here.
