Dan Schulman took global payments powerhouse PayPal (PYPL) to new heights during his nine-year tenure. When he announced his retirement from the position, the PayPal board needed to find a replacement who could live up to Schulman’s legacy. After a months-long search, Alex Chriss was chosen as CEO and President, effective September 27, 2023.

Schulman reflects on the choice of Chriss and the transition to his successor at PayPal. While still on the board of PayPal, he expressed the need for new leadership in his interview with Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi. “I've been doing this for almost a decade. You know, it's time… to bring in new leadership, to bring in new ideas, new thoughts," Schulman commented.

Chriss previously served as Executive Vice President and General Manager of Intuit's (INTU) Small Business and Self-Employed Group where he created Intuit's Partner & Developer Platform before serving as the Small Business Group's Chief Product Officer from 2017 to 2019.

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Video Transcript

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BRIAN SOZZI: Is it hard to pick your successor? And then what do you look for in them? Is it a Dan Shulman light? Is it someone that has a couple of your skills or your skills magnified?

DAN SCHULMAN: So the great news is most CEOs don't pick their successor, the board does. And that's a good thing. Because, you know, it's always hard when you have run a company for almost a decade, to think about who your successor could be. They took their time to do the right search, and they found a great successor in Alex Chriss.

I think Alex is, sort of, a natural born leader. What I told Alex is you have a great platform now, there's a lot of things to build on, but that he should be bold in his own way. Make decisions not necessarily continue with the things that I've done because that's the beauty of bringing in new leaders. And I-- kind of when I told the board that I wanted to retire, part of what I told them is like I've been doing this for almost a decade, it's time to bring in new leadership, to bring in new ideas, new thoughts.

And I think it's always difficult to say goodbye to something. Your identity is tied up in it, you know, but there's this Buddhist saying that goes something like, "if you have the courage to say goodbye, 100 hellos will await you." And like I'm just so happy with the transition. It's gone, I think, as classy as we could hope for it to be. I'm still on the board. I'll still be as helpful as I possibly can. But it's his company now, and I'm really supportive of that.