100 Most Powerful People in Business Methodology (2024)
Fortune’s editors scored each candidate for the 100 Most Powerful People in Business list on the following metrics:
- Size of the business the person runs, based on our screen that factors in mid-term
(three-year) and short-term (past 12 months) revenue and profit growth, profitability,
and market value. - Health of the business, based on trailing 12-month measures of liquidity, operating efficiency, and solvency.
- Innovation: Has the person accomplished something nobody else has and that
competitors followed? - Influence: How greatly do their words and actions shape the behavior of others?
- Trajectory: Where is the person in the arc of their career?
- Impact: Is this person using their power to make the world a better place?
What you’ll find on this list: leaders from 40 industries, ranging in age from their 30s to their 90s. You’ll come across very recognizable founders, chief executives of great businesses, disrupters, and innovators. What you won’t find: fossilized billionaires who are no longer active in business; nor will you find politicians, regulators, or seconds-in-command. (For our purposes, having a boss in the C-suite was a check on one’s power that usually excluded you. A few exceptions include companies where a succession plan is well underway.)
In the end, the people who earned places on the Most Powerful People list share a vital trait: Their words, deeds, and wealth shape what others around them think and do. Read more about the list.
Data editors: Scott DeCarlo and Aris Stavropoulos
This article appears in the December 2024/January 2025 issue of Fortune.