A chief executive officer (CEO) is the highest-ranking executive in a company, whose primary responsibilities include making major corporate decisions, managing the overall operations and resources of a company, acting as the main point of communication between the board of directors (the board) and corporate operations and being the public face of the company. A CEO is elected by the board and its shareholders, Investopedia notes.

The chief executive officer (CEO) is the top position in an organization and is responsible for implementing existing plans and policies, ensuring the successful management of the business and setting future strategy.

The CEO is ultimately responsible for the success or failure of the organization. As such, the CEO oversees the organization’s various functions, including compliance, finance, human resources, legal, marketing, operations, sales and technology. The CEO oversees these functions while considering the needs of different constituencies, or stakeholders, including employees, customers and investors.

EOs typically aim at achieving outcomes related to the organization’s mission, such as reducing poverty, increasing literacy, etc.

The responsibilities of an organization’s CEO are set by the organization’s board of directors or other authority, depending on the organization’s structure. They can be far-reaching or quite limited and are typically enshrined in a formal delegation of authority regarding business administration. Typically, responsibilities include being a decision maker on business strategy and other key policy issues, leader, manager, and executor. The communicator role can involve speaking to the press and the rest of the outside world, as well as to the organization’s management and employees; the decision-making role involves high-level decisions about policy and strategy.

As an executive officer of the company, the CEO reports the status of the business to the board of directors, motivates employees, and drives change within the organization. As a manager, the CEO presides over the organization’s day-to-day operations. The CEO is the person who is ultimately accountable for a company’s business decisions, including those in operations, marketing, business development, finance, human resources, etc.

The CEO of a company is not necessarily the owner or the head of the company, according to Wikipedia.