Margaret Cushing "Meg" Whitman was President and Chief Executive Officer of eBay from March 1998 to March 2008, when she stepped down from her role. She has been a director since March 1998, and continues to serve in that capacity. Ms. Whitman joined eBay when it was a small auction website with 30 employees and revenues of more than $4 million. According to Forbes magazine, Whitman was worth an estimated $1.4 billion in 2007. She is one of only seven women to have been repeatedly ranked among the world's most influential people by Time magazine. Whitman was mentioned as a possible Vice Presidential candidate for presumptive Republican presidential candidate John McCain until McCain picked Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. Whitman also has singing aspirations and reportedly auditioned for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in August 2008. She is a cousin of the choir's music director, Mack Wilberg.
Background and education
Whitman was born in Long Island, New York, the daughter of Hendricks Hallett Whitman and Margaret Whitman. Whitman attended Cold Spring Harbor High School in Cold Spring Harbor, New York. She earned a Bachelor of Economics from Princeton University where she was a member of the student organization Business Today. She received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1979.
Career
Before eBay, Ms. Whitman was with toymaker Hasbro Inc., overseeing global management and marketing of two of the world's best-known children's brands, Playskool and Mr. Potato Head. Prior to Hasbro, Meg was president and CEO of Florists Transworld Delivery , the world's largest floral products company. In previous years, she held executive positions at the Stride Rite Corporation and at the Walt Disney Company. Meg also worked for eight years at Bain & Company's San Francisco office, where she was a vice president. She began her career in 1979 at Procter & Gamble in Cincinnati, Ohio. Ms. Whitman also serves on the boards of the eBay Foundation, Procter & Gamble and DreamWorks Animation
Margaret Whitman
