My question would be "Ms. Martha Stewart do you have any insider trade information you could share with me?"

I found what Anna Banana Kruchten said to be quite interesting.  Many decades ago at a dinner party, there were 4 of us all in Sales:

• Aerospace CEO selling Missile Defense Systems for gazillions of $
  A luxury car dealer
  A shop girl selling dresses
  Me, in Real Estate

It was fascinating to realize that we were each in the exact same business: meeting the needs of our clients!   So to make my short story long, my question would again be, "What do you think is the most important aspect of your job?"

How do you hire and inspire quality employees?

I would like to know what they saw as a major turning point in their business for the good or the bad.

to attain that position, one needs to be "driven" and have hunger for "Power'.... do those characteristics ever become diluted? do they get old? does one eventually feel there's no where to go beyond that point and the "drive and hunger" fade away?  only three questions....close enough....they're all the same, just stated differently...

Thomas J. Nelson, Realtor, CRS If you had to do it all over again, what is the first thing you would do?

Do you think you are overpaid? Why? or Why not?

Would love to know who the major corporation is but, what I always find most inspirational is when they share their failures - what they did wrong and how they built upon that mistake to actually turn the company into a well-respected corporation.

One can always learn from others' failures and successes and apply them on a smaller scale to our own businesses, Thomas J. Nelson, Realtor, CRS.

    What are you investing your money in?

Could your company Rely and Thrive solely on your knowledge of your target market, and acceptance of your product (or service) by that market - and divorce yourselves from your massive government lobbying efforts and resultant subsidies, tax breaks, etc.???

In other words: Could you survive by ceasing to be a Crony-Capitalist, and operate in a Free Market environment?  (the most recent COB I met was not with the most respected Fortune low-2 digit company)

Interesting variety of answers but I do feel a CEO of a major corporation must have a goal that is always changing. My question would be how does he or she keep their eyes on a goal that is ever changing and do they constantly revamp their 2-5 year goal and what does that process look like?

Think of the biggest personal failure that you've had & how did you learn from it or turn it around? 

On that personal failure, did you know it would become a pivot point then or years later when you looked back on it?

What are your dreams/aspirations...??
What scares the heck out of you...??
What holds you back/what propels you forward...??
What is the one weakness that keeps re-surfacing...??
What is your unique strength...??
What's your passion...??

For me, I'm not particularly interested in 'canned/rehearsed/trite responses' -
My ONE Question... What wakes you up and makes you feel alive...??

When did you first know you were an entrepreneur?

Thomas I am with Nina Hollander on this one. I listen to big corporation conversations quite often as my husband is in the aerospace industry.  It is an entirely different structure and thought process than my small real estate company.

Frankly, nothing much... I spent 20 years in the corporate world and worked very closely with numerous Fortune 500 CEO's. Guess I got whatever questions I wanted answered way back when. Now... they are not of much interest to me... a large corporation is very different from a sole practioner of real estate.

great insight

I'm a points scavenger ;)

"If there was one thing you could do over, what would it be?"

Michael Setunsky nailed this one!

I would ask the CEO if I could be put im touch with their relo department.

Thomas J. Nelson, Realtor, CRS - how was your journey to this level?

How many failures did you survive?

What's your story, as Brian Buffini would ask...

I'd ask who has been/is a mentor to them and how has that person impacted their life?

I always want to know their big Why they are doing what they are doing and how it started. 

Will you be my coach?

I have read many of the biographies, good knowledge gleaned from all.

btw, i wrote this answer just for points.;)

Sorry, I'm not a scavenger, I follow you Thomas J. Nelson, Realtor, CRS 

Wanna go for a beer?

Highly doubtful that a CEO of a major corporation could answer ONE question that would help me move my career forward.  

Thomas,

I really like Susan Emo answer.    I think I would like to know what their style of management is.  We have always liked Jack Welch's style, and some of our favorite quotes are:  "Change before you have to" and, "control your own destiny or someone else will."   A

Is there a 'fast track' for administrative ascension for  the lower staff?

The closer you get to the office of the CEO the further from my reality they are. Eventually, they must morph from creator to manager to cheerleader. And if they were not being paid the big cheerleader buck, they may have a different story to tell. And since you specificly mentioned corporation, the talk would be about the morons in the board are more interested in counting pencils than investing in decoupling gravity or at least colored bubbles for kids.

I would ask 'The Donald' about the moment in his life when he knew he needed to march to his own drum and to at least the 3rd squeeze beyond that.

I especially love Richard's answer, that would make our lives better!  

I'd ask the most burning question on ALL of our minds... what is their experience with water rights! 

I do not need to ask this question.

What would of you done different in your first 5 years of working.

When you will be outsourced and replaced by someone with a turban? Aren't you ovepaid for what you do?

Why don't you  talk to your people in the trentches and get the real scoop

Most CEO's are not in the same realty as the working guy/girl. I think i would ask them if i could take over their re-locations. 

If the corporation is local, I'd like to land a contract to be the realtor of choice for their employees. Just like a relo company who has an agreement  with big brokerages and agents under the brokerages get the leads.  This will be between the company and myself under my broker.  I can then distribute the workload with my team.

I dont think a major CEO would relate to my business.  I'm interested in things like delegation and scaling.  Once a corporation is a major one, they're already lightyears passed those problems and the CEO may not have been the one to have tackled those hurdles when they were there.  If they were the CEO from when the business was smaller, I'd ask how they implemented systems of delegation, and how they approached scaling,