Oh sorry, I thought we were ignoring obvious real world requirements

No, because you’re arguing in bad faith. They said “anyone can do it” which is obvious bullshit as there are enough companies run into the ground by incompetent CEOs. I never said nobody else that is not currently a CEO could do it which is the strawman that you are implying.

Not OP, but I’ll give you a fair shot.

The summary is no, there is no ‘exact’ skillset specific to executives, as there are many types. There are however skills and traits that many have in common that are useful.

I’ll split them into three vague groups.- “politicians”, managers and industry experts.

The first category are social power players more than anything getting into their position due to connections and charisma. Their importance is playing the loyalties of other people - widely considered the most useless execs, even in business circles. If they’d be categorized by “skillset”, it’d be people skills (leadership) and connections to important people.

Managers are usually focused on economy and the running of an organization. They’ll often have both experience and academic knowledge of organizational structures, asset management and economics, helping their organization (at least on paper) make the most of their resources. They can be good at their job, but if they get too focused on the “on paper” economics they fall into the category of “greedy, money grabbing fucks who ruin everything they touch”.

The last and (in my mind) best category are the industry experts. Often they’ll have come from within a company or organization and have in-depth knowledge of how things work and what is “important” in a business. These sorts are the “boring” ones we don’t hear much about, often having started their a business and grown it, or come from within and sat in leadership for decades. On the flipside they’ll have opinions without any obvious basis, “This is just how it is done”, which is in many cases important, but in others pure BS.

In all three categories you’ll find execs who are good and bad in different ways.

No…it was agreeing to the fact that CEOs shouldn’t be paid ridiculous amounts. Since I don’t do the labor, I don’t take pay, and that’s how it should be.

I fail to see how that is a gotcha? Do people here actually think CEOs should be paid for that? If so, I maintain my stance, they shouldn’t.