Warp Speed: 6 CEOs who climbed the corporate ladder crazy fast

At 34, Daniel Schwartz isn’t exactly a child anymore. But it’s certainly tempting to label him as some kind of “wunderkind” given his meteoric career trajectory. He was 33 when he landed the top executive job at Burger King. This week, he added our beloved Tim Hortons to his corporate kingdom.

And he’s still only 34.

He’s not the youngest CEO ever to take the helm of a major company. Just look at Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, who turned 30 in May.

The tech world is littered with brilliant young leaders who are changing the world through their own creations and raking in billions while they’re at it.

But outside of Silicon Valley, with a handful of exceptions, those, such as Schwartz, who rose to power at a young age – specifically a company they didn’t found themselves -- remain almost as elusive as the unicorn.

Those of you who are older than, say, 35, should be comforted to know that the wisdom that comes with silver hair still holds sway at the board table over the bold bloom of youth.
The average age of an incoming CEO at a company in the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index was 53 in 2013, according to Bloomberg.

As for you younger workers, well, if you are seriously eyeing the corner office and wonder how to make the leap before your next birthday, check out the following list of fresh-faced leaders who landed in the seat of power when the rest of us were still learning to walk:

Daniel Schwartz, 34, CEO of Burger King since 2013 and incoming CEO of Tim Hortons
Raised in Long Island, New York. Majored in management and applied economics at Cornell University. Schwartz got his first big break when, at 24, he was hired as an analyst with 3G Capital Partners, a private-equity firm. In 2010, he orchestrated 3G’s purchase of Burger King, becoming the fast-food chain’s new deputy chief financial officer. In 2011, he was named chief financial officer. He’s considered a savvy money guy who spent some time flipping burgers and cleaning toilets at Burger King locations in an effort to better under the company and find cost savings. In recent interviews, he said his favourite Tim Hortons drink is a Double Double.

Marissa Mayer, 39, CEO of Yahoo since 2012. Born in Wausau, Wis. She graduated Stanford University with a masters in computer science. Mayer was one of the first people through the door of Google in 2000. While with the company, she led several key projects including Google Maps and Gmail. Her appointment, at the age of 37, as CEO of competitor Yahoo surprised many industry watchers. An unauthorized biography published by Business Insider suggests she got the job after interim CEO Ross Levinsohn failed to impress board directors that he was leading the company on the right track. She has described herself in interviews as a “geek” and kicked up controversy among her own employees when she banned them from working from home. Nevertheless, Mayer is widely credited with reviving Yahoo’s reputation as a tech leader. A year after she took over the top job, the company’s stock price skyrocketed as it acquired desirable start-ups like Tumblr.

Mark Wiseman, 44, CEO of the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board since July 2012. Raised in Burlington, Ont., Wiseman earned a law degree and MBA at University of Toronto and his masters in law at Yale University, where he was a Fulbright Scholar. His early career saw him work as a corporate lawyer for Sullivan & Cromwell, a top Wall Street firm in New York and Paris. He later returned to Toronto and partnered with Brent Belzberg at the merchant bank Harrowston Inc. He left the company just days before Sept. 11, 2001. Wiseman was 42 when he took on the top job managing the CPPIB’s $170-billion pension fund. He’d served as the fund’s senior vice-president of private investments since 2005. Prior to that he managed the private equity fund at the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. In his bio on the U of T website, he described his current position as “one of the coolest jobs in Canada.”

Daniel Friedmann, 58, CEO of aerospace giant MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. Born in Chile, raised in Vancouver, B.C. He received his masters in engineering physics from the Unviersity of B.C. in 1979. His first job was at MDA at the age of 22. In an interview with the Globe and Mail, he said he had to beg to be hired on. He wrote several letters to founding CEO John MacDonald pleading to be given a chance. Friedmann was just shy of his 40th birthday when he became CEO himself in 1995. He was 37 when he was named company president. He got the job the traditional way: rising up through the ranks. Though his company is a leader in space technology, Friedmann said he prefers his bicycle to the space shuttle. “I’m self-powered. I’m not into engines,” he told the Globe in 2012.

Robert Milton, 53, former CEO of Air Canada (1999-2004) and former chair and CEO of Ace Aviation Holdings Inc., a holding company that once held majority shares in Air Canada (2004-2012). Born in Boston, Mass., Milton received a BSc in industrial management from the Georgia Institute of Technology. Milton joined Air Canada as a consultant in 1992. He became CEO in 1999 at the age 38, just in time to fight a hostile takeover led by Onex Corp and American Airlines. His legacy is cloudy and controversial. Some accuse him of dragging the airline down into bankruptcy in 2003/04, others herald his ability to lead it back out of trouble as a much stronger entity. The Wall Street Journal lists Milton as lead independent director at Air Lease Corp.. With offices in Los Angeles and Dublin, the company website describes its main business as providing airlines worldwide with operating leases on new aircraft.

Darren Entwistle, 52, former CEO of Telus. Born in Montreal, Que., Entwistle earned an MBA from McGill University. He joined the company in 2000 as CEO at the age of 38 after a career in telecommunications. He served 14 years in the top job before comfirming in March he was stepping down. He is widely credited with growing the company into one of the Canada’s telecommunications giants alongside Rogers and Bell. The Vancouver Sun reported that Telus revenues have climbed 90 per cent since Entwistle took over as leader, with wireless driving the growth. Entwistle remains with Telus as executive chairman of the board, while Joe Natale, another long-time Telus exec, officially took over at the helm in May.