In theory, that's true. But what I see every day is the opposite. It's essentially what people are calling "enshitification". Mostly short term decisions that screw customers up for a quick buck.
I do agree that private does not mean good. It all falls under the CEO/Founders in my view. But there seems to be way more greedy short term thinking leaders out there.
I can probably count in my hands the amount of companies I follow that are not prioritizing the short-term. Maybe I just don't follow that many companies and I'm biased, but that's the impression I get.
Public companies seem to have an even higher rate of short-term profit seeking though.
It starts out noble. Once a company goes public, the first few town halls after the shareholder call the CEO or CFO will be like, "Don't worry about the stock price, we're better than all the other short-termist companies, we care about long term quality and blah blah."
But bit by bit, little by little, like Pavlov's dogs the employees get trained to peek at that stock ticker around reporting time. And over time they sync up their decision making with that schedule, and internal planning starts to reflect it. And new initiatives get created and judged by investor reactions. And it's all downhill from there :-(
I do agree that private does not mean good. It all falls under the CEO/Founders in my view. But there seems to be way more greedy short term thinking leaders out there.
I can probably count in my hands the amount of companies I follow that are not prioritizing the short-term. Maybe I just don't follow that many companies and I'm biased, but that's the impression I get.
Public companies seem to have an even higher rate of short-term profit seeking though.