Fortune released its inaugural list of the World’s Greatest Leaders on Thursday, and Apple CEO Tim Cook grabbed the #33 spot on a list that includes Pope Francis, Bill Clinton, Dalai Lama, and other dignitaries.
Fortune on why Cook made the list. (Via 9to5Mac):
Following Steve Jobs has arguably been the toughest corporate leadership assignment in decades, yet Cook has carried it off with mostly quiet aplomb. In 2½ years he has kept the parade of winning new products marching (the Retina display, new operating systems, the iPhone 5), and he is bringing in Burberry’s savior, Angela Ahrendts, to run Apple’s retail stores. That’s thinking different.
Tim Cook sits on the list ahead of other tech execs like YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, but trailing Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Alibaba’s Jack Ma.
Fortune doesn’t use an exact formula to select members of the list, explaining:
We have drawn a distinction between leaders and people who are admirable and powerful but who are not transformative leaders. Simply running a large organization or serving in an influential role does not meet the threshold to be on this list. All candidates had to be currently active; thus no retirees or recently deceased great leaders, such as Nelson Mandela. We asked several noted leadership experts to suggest candidates, combined their ideas with others turned up by Fortune reporters, and vetted our nominees with experts in their respective fields. Then we made our final judgments based on the reality that while leadership can’t be measured, we all know it when we see it.
Other notables on the list include German Chancellor Angela Merkel (#2), U2 lead singer and activist Bono (#8), and Yankee shortstop Derek Jeter (#11).
