I don't agree. He might be ok comparing to disaster in Yahoo! or HP but not comparing to, for example, Oracle, Apple, etc.<p>First, I would like to say that 'earning/revenue' graphs as a proof that somebody is a good CEO can be very misleading because it does not include how that revenue is achieved (tell that to Leman Brothers investors)<p>Steve Ballmer job as a CEO is to lead and to ensure that Miscrosoft will be there forever. I'm not convinced he is doing a good job on that part: yes he optimized the current business model to the maximum, but I really don't see how MSFT will be able to grow or at least stay of same size as today.<p>For example, lets take his comment about Oracle. Larry has a clear vision to make Oracle one-stop-shop for all enterprise software and hardware. And he is succeeding in that. Oracle is buying companies. Oracle is building products like ExaData (they are selling these things like hot-cases... 1M a piece). So you can see future of Oracle.<p>On other hand, what is his vision of MSFT? Where is money going to come? Mobile... they are 3rd. Internet? Loosing money. The only good thing going on is XBox - but that cannot cover revenue when MS Office dies down.
In other words, MS Windows and Office licences (60% of revenue) will dry out. What then?
"He" might not be doing that great job himself. If anything he's doing a great job by staying out of the way of other employees like Steve Sinofsky, and so on.<p>And it remains to be seen if Windows 8 will actually be a successful product. It's not as clear cut was it was for Windows 7.