Worst: Vikram Pandit
Pandit has had a tough go in his two years as chief of Citigroup, as shown by his meager 45% positive rating, according to Zeta.
But he has done little to endear himself to shareholders, employees, and the government after Citi received $45 million in federal bailout money.
Early in the year, Pandit tried to make amends by asking for a one-dollar salary until the company returned to profitability. A month later he claimed Citi was profitable in the first two months of the year. But when better-than-expected first-quarter results were reported in April, observers warned that the numbers were padded.
Things only got worse: by June, FDIC chairman Sheila Bair was said to be lobbying for his removal.
NEXT: Worst: Edward Liddy
Last updated December 30 2009: 2:06 PM ET
How it was done: Zeta's technology mines the online media landscape -- including millions of blogs, message boards, and social media posts -- and then uses algorithms to measure both the volume and tone of conversations about a given subject -- in this case, the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. Rankings are based on the percentage of total chatter about a given CEO that is qualified as positive.
