Career Choices and Company Leadership

eWeek recently published the Top 100 Most Influential People in IT.

EMC CEO Joe Tucci

Cheers most notably to Microsoft; EMC & VMware; IBM; and Google -- home to volumes of movers & shakers in IT.

At Microsoft -- an amazing 9 execs made the Top 100.

At EMC & VMware (VMware is “an EMC company”) – an impressive showing of 4 execs were among the Top 50. Notably,

• Joe Tucci, EMC CEO was ranked as the 7^th most influential person in IT
• Mark Lewis, EMC President of Content Management and Archiving and author of http://marksblog.emc.com was ranked as the 50^th most influential.

IBM and Google also graced the Top 100 with 4 spots each.

What does a list like this have to do with career choices?

Business is tough and tech is tougher than many other industries given the pace of change. If you’re going to attach your train to a company in a dynamic industry consider strongly the influence and the track record of its leaders and of its culture. Good leaders and powerful cultures will help make your career ride a continuously progressive one.

EMC has reinvented itself more than six times in its nearly 30-year tenure. This ability takes a culture that is agile, open to change and able to execute with speed and passion.

Our most recent transformation came at the hands and strategic vision of Joe Tucci, #7 on the list. Joe helped EMC grow revenues about 150% from 2002 through 2007. Business Week called the Tucci-led transformation the most stunning turnaround in the history of technology and Institutional Investor named Tucci the CEO of the year for two consecutive years.

Today, EMC is one of the fastest growing companies in high tech in terms of revenue and profit growth. The company is also one of the ten most valuable (market cap) major IT product companies in the world. Yet at “only $13+ billion”, EMC has plenty of headroom compared to its “Top 10” tech peers. In career terms, this amounts to the potential for great professional growth.

Net: it is not only cool to have your CEO be among the most influential people in your industry – it serves to help your career continuity and growth.

Talk Back------------------

Are you at a company with top industry influencers and a powerful culture? If so, what has it meant to your career?