Meg Whitman is a prominent business leader best known for her tenure as CEO of eBay from 1998 to 2008, where she grew the company's sales from $5.7 million to $8 billion. Her career includes leadership roles at Hewlett-Packard from 2011 to 2015, during which she oversaw the company's split into HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Whitman also served as the United States ambassador to Kenya from 2022 to 2024.
Prior to her ambassadorial role, Whitman was involved in various board positions, including at Procter & Gamble and General Motors. She also briefly led the short-lived video platform Quibi, which shut down just seven months after its launch in October 2020. Whitman stepped down as HP's chief executive in 2018.
Whitman's personal life includes a notable run for Governor of California in 2010 as a Republican, where she spent a reported $140 million of her own funds on the campaign but ultimately lost. Her husband, Griffith Harsh, is a respected neurosurgeon and Rhodes Scholar. Whitman holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a degree from Princeton University.
Reflecting on her career, Whitman has shared that her mother's advice, 'you don't have to be perfect to be a leader, but you can't be timid', influenced her decision to join eBay. This mindset helped her transition from running a multimillion-dollar business at Hasbro to seizing the opportunity at eBay.