The CEO, unless they are also the founder, is just an employee too. They are not a risk-taker or an innovator, they are just a manager. Everyone forgets that. Maybe they could be paid 10x as much as an entry-level employer but 100 or 500 or 1000x is insane
That's right. People also seem to come up with the point that the manager can make a huge difference to the company, but they forget that can also mean a huge negative difference. Ordinary employees tend not to be able to destroy a company on their own.
Wouldn't that imply you should be far more careful and selective with your choice of CEO since they can do much more damage? If anything I'd use this as an argument to pay as much as you can afford for the "best". Anything less poses significant risk of damage to the company.
Depends on how that tradeoff works. If you wanted to push up CEO salaries, certainly. But you could as well see that recruitment due diligence is of limited power.
