Margaret Whitman

Margaret Cushing "Meg" Whitman (born August 4, 1956) is an American business executive. A native of Long Island, New York, she is a graduate of Princeton University and Harvard Business School. Whitman served as an executive in The Walt Disney Company where she was vice president of strategic planning throughout the 1980s. In the 1990s, she served as an executive for DreamWorks, Procter & Gamble, and Hasbro.Whitman served as President and Chief Executive Officer of eBay from 1998 to 2008. During her ten years with the company she oversaw expansion from 30 employees and $4 million in annual revenue to more than 15,000 employees and $8 billion in annual revenue.In February 2009, Whitman announced her candidacy for Governor of California, becoming the third woman in a twenty year period to run for the office. She won the Republican primary in June 2010. The fourth wealthiest woman in the state of California with a net worth of $1.3 billion in 2010, she spent more of her own money on her candidacy than any other self-funded political candidate in U.S. history,  spending $144 million total of her own fortune and $178.5 million including donors.  Whitman lost to Jerry Brown in the November 2 electionBeginning her career in 1979 as a brand manager at Procter & Gamble in Cincinnati, Ohio, Whitman later moved on to work as a consultant at Bain & Company's San Francisco office. She then rose through the ranks to achieve the position of senior Vice President.Whitman became vice president of strategic planning at The Walt Disney Company in 1981. Ten years later she would join the Stride Rite Corporation, before becoming president and CEO of Florists' Transworld Delivery in 1995.As Hasbro's Playskool Division General Manager, she oversaw global management and marketing of two children's brands, Playskool and Mr. Potato Head starting in January 1997. She also imported the UK's children's television show Teletubbies into the U.S.

Whitman joined eBay on March 1998, when it had 30 employees and revenues of approximately $4 million. During her time as CEO, the company grew to approximately 15,000 employees and $8 billion in annual revenue by 2008.  Originally, when Whitman had joined eBay, she found the website as a simple black and white webpage with courier font. On her first day, the site crashed for eight hours.  She believed the site to be confusing and began by building a new executive team.  Whitman organized the company by splitting it into twenty-three business categories. She then assigned executives to each, including some 35,000 subcategories. In 2004, Whitman made several key changes in her management team. Jeff Gordon took overPayPal, Matt Bannick took control of international operations and Bill Cobb was placed in control of U.S. operations,  which has the colorful U.S. logo, while each international site has unique branding. 

eBay's logo.

Shortly after taking the company public, Whitman told how stock for the company would rise 80 points and fall 50 points in a single day. Soon after, Whitman received a call at her eBay office from Arthur Levitt, Jr., Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). She called in her general counsel and the two sat down and answered the line on speaker phone. Instead of any perceived negative reaction to stock volatility, Levitt was calling to ask about the company going public and was concerned about whether the SEC was customer-friendly. He also discussed his interest in collectible Depression era glass, post 1929. During Whitman's tenure as CEO, eBay completed the purchase of Skype for $4.1B in cash and stock in September 2005.  In 2009, Skype was sold by eBay at a valuation of $2.75B. In June 2007, while preparing for an interview with Reuters, Whitman allegedly shoved her subordinate, communications employee Young Mi Kim. Of the incident, Whitman related, "In any high-pressure working environment, tensions can surface". Kim also stated, “Yes, we had an unfortunate incident, but we resolved it in a way that speaks well for her and for eBay”. The matter was resolved after a $200,000 settlement.Whitman resigned as CEO of eBay in November 2007, but remained on the Board and served as an advisor to new CEO John Donahoe until late 2008. She was inducted into the U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 2008. "I've said for some time that 10 years is roughly the right time to stay at the helm at a company like ours", adding that "it's time for new leadership, a new perspective and a new vision", she said in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle.Whitman has received numerous awards and accolades for her work at eBay. On more than one occasion, she was named among the Top Five most powerful women by Fortune Magazine.  Harvard Business Review has named her the eighth-best-performing CEO of the past decade  as well as having the Financial Times name her as one of the 50 faces that shaped the decade. 

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