Forty percent of workers say they have not met their CEOs, according to a new CareerBuilder survey of more than 7,000 full-time workers.
The survey also finds that workers in business services, sales and manufacturing are most likely to have met their CEO while most workers in IT, financial services and retail say they have not met their CEOs. Another 21 percent of respondents say they don't know what their CEOs look like. Respondents in the Midwest and South are least likely to know what their CEOs look like at 23 percent.
Among the respondents, their knowledge of the organizational chart decline significantly after the CEO. In fact, only 35 percent of respondents can name all of the C-level officers at their organizations, and 21 percent of respondents can only name some C-level officers.
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According to the survey, there is a familiarity with senior leadership that does not exactly associate with knowledge of the company's financial performance. Sixty-eight percent of respondents are unaware of how much their company generates in revenue on an annual basis.
"Leadership from the C-suite can be a difficult balance," says Rosemary Haefner, vice president of human resources at CareerBuilder. "The CEO and, in some cases, other senior leaders are the face of the company both internally and externally. Meaning, they need to find a level of accessibility that allows them to connect with employees while, on the other hand, dedicate the necessary time for building relationships with outside stakeholders. Employees realize their top leaders can't know everyone on a first name basis, but they do expect their leaders to be a public symbol that embodies the organization's values."
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