I look forward to Barron’s annual listing of the World’s Best CEOs every June. It is a good barometer of which CEOs are consistently making their numbers and excelling at capital growth. The typical criteria have been revenue, earnings growth and shareholder returns plus they also rely on the judgement of a panel of reporters and editors. This year, understandably, they switched out the financially-oriented and capital allocation criteria for how leaders handled the multitude of crises that CEOs woke up to this year such as COVID-19, trade wars, economic fallout, the killing of George Floyd and others, etc. They weighed the “leaders’ preparedness for, and performance under, extraordinary circumstances.” Extraordinary is an understatement. Reputations are shaped by no less than intangibles such as reputation risk management when it comes to CEOs.

Barron’s said they limited their review to U.S. CEOs and leaned more heavily on their editorial panel's judgement this year, focusing on the answers to several key questions. Here are the questions that Barron’s listed in its article (note: subscriber paywall).

1. How well had chief executives prepared their companies for unknowable difficulties?

2. How quickly and skillfully did they respond to the pandemic to keep workers safe, customers cared for, and investors confident?

3. And, in some cases, how did they add to the fight against Covid-19?

4. Did this year's stress prove the resiliency of their business models, or lay bare the vulnerabilities?

These are good questions for all leaders to be evaluating themselves on. Especially the latter one which every CEO should answer and pose to their senior teams to get at the heart of their business strategy. The next unknowable crisis is probably around the corner.

Here is the list of the 25 CEOs that Barron’s named to their Best CEOs list. Note that they are not in any rank order but listed in order by mention in the article.

Barron’s Best CEOs 2020

C. Douglas McMillon, Walmart

Jeffrey Bezos, Amazon

W. Craig Jelinek, Costco Wholesale

Larry Merlo, CVS

Marvin Ellison, Lowe’s

Tobias Lütke, Shopify

Daniel O'Day, Gilead Sciences

Leonard Schleifer, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals

Kenneth Frazier, Merck

Brian Moynihan, Bank of America

Laurence Fink, Black Rock

Adena Friedman, Nasdaq

Eric Yuan, Zoom Video

Jensen Huang, Nvidia

Satya Nadella, Microsoft

Reed Hastings, Netflix

Tim Cook, Apple

Mary Barra, GM

Tricia Griffith, Progressive

Brian Niccol, Chipotle Mexican Grill

Douglas Baker, Ecolab

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook

Elon Musk, Tesla

Larry Culp, GE