Now Jeff Zucker Must Prove Himself Yet Again

For two years, it was the worst-kept secret in the media and entertainment world. Jeff Zucker, the boy wonder with the P.T. Barnum shtick, was General Electric Co.'s (GE ) slam-dunk choice to replace Bob Wright as chief executive of NBC Universal Inc. Reading the tea leaves wasn't hard. GE CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt had barely bothered to interview outsiders for the job. Besides, so many top executives had left NBC Universal in recent months that few of Zucker's internal rivals were left standing.

Still, by Feb. 6, when GE finally got around to announcing what everyone already knew, skeptics had spent months wondering aloud if Zucker, 41, had the strategic vision and background to lead the $16 billion media company in a YouTube universe. Even Immelt acknowledges that complacency was partly to blame for NBC's slide from first to fourth place in prime-time ratings during Zucker's three years as head of the TV group. "It's actually hard to go from No. 1 to No. 4. When we were on top, we didn't take enough risks to get the next generation going," he says. "[We] stayed too true to what was Friends, what was formulaic."