Basic Trope: A senior manager, CEO or owner of a major definitely-for-profit corporation who is out to make as much money and gain as much power as possible, by any means available, regardless of who suffers.
- Straight: President Evil, the CEO of Trope Co., underpays and overworks the employees while awarding himself huge bonuses, uses unethical methods to drive competitors out of business, makes corporate decisions based on short-term profit rather than the long-term financial health of the company, and cheats at golf.
- Exaggerated:
- President Evil uses blatantly illegal methods to drive competitors out of business, actively seeks to destroy the health and livelihood of as many non-corporate executives as possible, has no problem wrecking the world (in every possible meaning of the word) to obtain a buck, runs the corporation as a giant Ponzi scheme, and hunts down employees for sport when he is not literally selling them for additional money (any amount -- even a single cent will suffice).
- The world is a Dystopia where every single business institution is a MegaCorp run by an evil businessman.
- The CEO of the Super Race Foundation uses mercenaries who are Those Wacky Nazis to support his (very literally) hostile takeovers of companies or get rid of any whistleblowers, or people who try to get in the way of his schemes, or who plain piss him off.
- Evil is The Sociopath who goes on mass murder sprees For the Evulz and gets away with it because of his insane wealth.
- Downplayed:
- President Evil is a villain, but his villainous deeds are completely unrelated to his business practices.
- President Evil is nice, benevolent to his employees, and doesn't do any sketchy business practices, but his company still engages in malevolent economic niches like warmongering and addictive pharmaceuticals.
- President Evil is not actively cruel to his employees or trying to screw over the common man, but his "legal shortcuts" and sketchy budget planning to get his way and make sure his company succeed, tends to leave some damage in their wake.
- President Evil is a Knight Templar or other villain with non-financial motives, who merely uses Trope Co as a source of Offscreen Villain Dark Matter.
- President Evil provides a good product and efficient service to his customer base, and significant profits to his shareholders, but both of these are dependent on mistreating and exploiting his employees in the name of "efficiency".
- President Evil is willing to bend the rules and resort to legally questionable methods, but has a point where he draws the line.
- Justified:
- When he used to play nice, the company could barely stay afloat.
- Alternatively, Evil is utterly ruthless out of a fanatical dream to use his company to remake the world in the image of something he holds dear, whatever the cost. Or alternatively if the setting is After the End or something close TO it, because he HAS to keep anything functioning or otherwise doing anything worthwhile.
- President Evil got his job through nepotism, and doesn't know or care how to run a business legitimately or ethically.
- Evil is like this because he finds sadistic pleasure in being able to have so much power over those who work for him, and the ability to cause great harm to those who he deems "lesser" than himself while being able to avoid the consequences of his actions due to his money and influence.
- Inverted:
- A poor but honest laborer.
- A shamelessly corrupt — poor laborer, full of big dreams.
- Honest Corporate Executive
- A corrupt, greedy Dirty Communist administrator, shamelessly stealing from his more honest comrades.
- Subverted: The heroes think President Evil is a Corrupt Corporate Executive, but he is actually an honest and thrifty person who runs the company according to strict ethical and legal guidelines.
- Double Subverted: So the Board of Directors of Trope Co fire that CEO and hire one that promises them maximum profits by any means necessary.
- Parodied:
- The Trope Co Board of Directors hire Dastardly Whiplash to be their CEO on the grounds that all corporate executives are corrupt, so they might as well hire an outright villain.
- President Evil is a pointy-haired jerk who keeps relying on silly schemes without seeing that he can make lots and lots of even more money with mundane means, but nobody in Trope Co seems to notice, because they are all distracted by the Get Rich Quick promises.
- Zig-Zagged: President Evil seems to be corrupt, but is actually staying within ethical and legal guidelines... until the stock prices fall, at which point he starts using illegal methods, but then he is called out on it by his innocent daughter, so he returns to proper behavior, only to be fired in favor of a more profit-driven CEO.
- Averted:
- All corporate executives in the story are simply businessmen who do their jobs, without overreaching or using unethical methods.
- Corporate executives are absent in the setting.
- Enforced:
- The executives demanded that the work should have an anti-corporate slant. The writer is on board, and he had an unpleasant run-in with corporations in his past.
- Alternatively: "We need a major Unfettered antagonist with no restrictions whatsoever except Greed. Executives who desire profit are acceptable to mock. Let's use one of those."
- "The majority of viewers hate their bosses and jobs anyway, so the boss is evil. Besides, Ambition Is Evil, and you have gotta have a truckload of the stuff to climb to the top of the corporate ladder."
- Lampshaded: "Just how does this plan make money for Trope Co, as opposed to you, personally?"
- Invoked: The Trope Co Board of Directors deliberately hire a CEO who promises big profits by any means necessary, and refuse to hire anyone who seems too law-abiding.
- Defied: Trope Co has strict ethical guidelines, and fires any executive that crosses the line.
- Exploited: Evil's personal assistant uses her boss' malfeasance to hide her own embezzlement, secure in the knowledge that he will be blamed for any illegal actions.
- Discussed:
- "I think we will find someone at Trope Co's responsible for this outrage. You can never trust corporate types." "Yeah. I've met one of those in person before. He's a nutsack."
- "Of course I am sneeringly evil. Why did you expect to find up here, a nursery crèche and kitten sanctuary?"
- Conversed: "Why are there no good executives on this show?" "Because it is hard to convince the audience that there are good apples. Plus, the audience likes another jab at capitalism, which never gets old."
- Deconstructed:
- President Evil made his way to the top by ruthlessness and greed, but discovers once he is up there that his wealth is hollow, and that he has no actual friends, only yes-men, but he has to keep up his corrupt ways, despite the growing pit of emptiness in his soul, because Trope Co will collapse unless he does not. Worse, reformers in government are trying to enforce the law and the investigation is getting very close to him. However, this is all pointless as the costs for PR to cover the villainy & keep people willing to deal with Trope Co mount, consuming more and more of the budget, and the more Genre Savvy realize that there was really no way that buying good publicity could work forever.
- Being a corrupt CEO is tantamount to Stupid Evil. Several cases of employee mistreatment leads to the company getting bad publicity and finding itself on the receiving end of multiple lawsuits. Making corporate decisions based on short-term profit rather than the long-term financial health of the company is inherently counterproductive. Ultimately, the CEO's short-sighted policies and embezzlement nearly drive the company into the ground. The board of directors decides to replace the CEO with someone less corrupt.
- The CEO fails to realize that he is mortal like everyone else. And despite his highly paid personal militia, he ends up killed by one of the persons whose life he destroyed in his quest for status and money.
- The CEO's greed is so relentless that even when there is literally nothing to gain from his actions, he still goes with it anyways because of just the smallest possibility of gaining short term dollars. In the end, he absolutely destroys everything in the pursuit of his greed, and still refuses to acknowledge how he's also made his own ill-gained fortune utterly worthless, because he is absolutely addicted to the power by this point that it just doesn't matter to him.
- Reconstructed:
- Evil is reminded that life at the top is pretty cool after all, and he can Screw the Rules, I Have Money! to buy new friends and get the government off his back.
- The new CEO engages in Pragmatic Villainy, making him harder to get rid of, hence a more credible threat to the heroes.
- The new CEO doesn't engage in blatantly "corrupt" actions like underpaying his employees, but is widely seen as corrupt due to his vocal opposition to ESG. He is hard to get rid of because his shareholders are satisfied with his work.
- Played For Laughs: Evil is convinced that he is a Villain with Good Publicity just because he is a well-known figure in general; everyone else, including many of the employees, are aware of his corruption and rightfully treat him as a scummy Pointy-Haired Boss.
Miss Haberdasher, take a note. "Dear TV Tropes, I am appalled by your characterization of the CEO of Trope Co., myself, as a less than honest person. Cease and desist, or I will buy your internet provider and shut you down. Yours Truly, etc." And send it back to Corrupt Corporate Executive.
