CEOs Are Different from Us (and from CFOs)

Just 9.8% of chief executives can be categorized as risk-averse, compared with 64% of the (similarly aged) general population, according to a survey of about 1,000 top leaders in the U.S. by John R. Graham, Campbell R. Harvey, and Manju Puri of Duke University. Moreover, 80% of CEOs are very optimistic, well above the mean. CEOs are also much more optimistic than CFOs; only 65% of CFOs can be classified as very optimistic.