Marc Benioff, cofounder and CEO of Salesforce, has taken a lot of hits in recent months. First, activist investors went after him, attacking his expensive taste in acquisitions and agitating for greater efficiency at the enterprise software maker. Then, his employees lashed out: After about 8,000 of them were laid off in January, many of those who remained took to Slack—ironically, one of Benioff’s expensive acquisitions—to complain that the company’s touchy-feely culture was just a facade.
“I’m willing to take the bullets and the cuts and the vilification,” Benioff, 58, tells me during a wide-ranging interview that took place via phone while he was on a flight to the East Coast. “That’s what you have to do as CEO, especially through difficult times.”
