Why Bangladesh can't produce global CEOs

Every few years, another Indian-origin executive rises to lead one of the world's largest corporations. Google, Microsoft, Adobe, IBM and other global companies have entrusted their future to leaders whose careers began in India.

Consider Shankh Mitra. The Welltower CEO received total compensation of $821.1 million in 2025, making him the second-highest-paid chief executive among US public companies that year, behind Elon Musk. Most of Mitra's compensation came through performance-linked stock awards.

It is tempting to explain such achievements simply as stories of exceptional talent. But that is only half the story.

Bangladesh is not short of talent. Yet it has not yet produced a corporate leader based in Bangladesh who has gone on to lead a Fortune Global 500 company.

The difference is not intelligence but the ecosystem.

Consider Robin Khuda, founder and CEO of AirTrunk, one of the world's leading hyperscale data-centre operators. Born and raised in Dhaka, Robin moved to Australia in 1997 for higher studies, built his career there and eventually founded a company that is now committing $30 billion to expand data-centre capacity in India by 2030.

His story is revealing. Bangladesh produced the talent. Another ecosystem enabled it to operate on a global scale.

Global CEOs emerge from environments that expose future leaders to scale, complexity, international markets and strategic decision-making long before they reach the corner office.

What did India get right? 

Satya Nadella joined Microsoft in 1992 and spent more than two decades advancing through increasingly senior roles, including leading its cloud business, before becoming CEO. Sundar Pichai joined Google in 2004 and gradually assumed responsibility for products used by billions before becoming CEO. 

Arvind Krishna spent more than three decades at IBM, leading major businesses including cloud and artificial intelligence, before taking the helm.

None became CEO overnight. Their organisations gave them increasingly challenging assignments, broader responsibilities and exposure to global operations. Their careers demonstrate a critical lesson: multinational companies do not simply recruit CEOs. They cultivate them.

India's vast technology and services industries have put millions of professionals in contact with global clients, multinational teams and complex cross-border operations. Engineers, managers and consultants routinely work on problems that extend far beyond the Indian market.

Bangladesh needs more internationally ambitious companies, stronger industry-academia links, deeper participation in global technology and consulting ecosystems, executive exchange programmes, and leadership-development systems that prepare professionals not merely to manage operations but to shape strategy across borders.

On the other hand, Bangladesh's corporate story has evolved differently.

Much of our economic success remains concentrated in manufacturing rather than in global product development, multinational acquisitions or internationally integrated management structures.

Few Bangladeshi companies operate across continents at a scale that consistently prepares executives for global leadership. As a result, many professionals become excellent operators while having fewer opportunities to manage businesses across different markets, cultures and regulatory systems.

Professional pathways matter, too. Many Indian executives spend their formative years at organisations such as Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Accenture and other global technology and consulting companies. These organisations function as leadership academies. They expose young professionals to international clients, digital transformation, mergers and acquisitions, board-level decision-making and global strategy.

Bangladesh has multinational companies that offer similar exposure, but career progression is often country-focused. Even successful country heads may have fewer opportunities to move into regional or global roles because corporate headquarters tend to view Bangladesh primarily as a market rather than as a source of future global executives.

Education strengthens this ecosystem. The Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management have become global talent brands. Their graduates are spread across Silicon Valley, Wall Street and multinational corporations, creating networks through which mentorship, recommendations and opportunities flow.

Then there is the diaspora. The United Nations estimates that around 18 million people born in India live outside the country, making it the world's largest country of origin for international migrants. This creates an extraordinary professional network across sectors. Every successful Indian executive abroad can become a mentor, connector or advocate for others.

Bangladesh's diaspora has made extraordinary contributions through remittances, entrepreneurship and trade. But we should broaden our ambition: Bangladeshis should not only send money home; they should also occupy more of the world's boardrooms. This should make us proud rather than lead us to see it only as brain drain.

Bangladesh has repeatedly shown that it can compete globally when it invests patiently. The garment industry, pharmaceuticals and digital financial services demonstrate what entrepreneurship, policy support and institutional commitment can achieve.

The next frontier is leadership. Bangladesh needs more internationally ambitious companies, stronger industry-academia links, deeper participation in global technology and consulting ecosystems, executive exchange programmes, and leadership-development systems that prepare professionals not merely to manage operations but to shape strategy across borders.

Bangladesh does not need to copy India. It needs to build its own ecosystem—one in which a talented young Bangladeshi can move from managing a local business to leading a regional one, then a multinational one, without leaving the country to find the opportunities that enable global leadership.