Meet Neal Mohan the Indian origin YouTube boss named TIME’s CEO of the Year

New Delhi: YouTube’s top boss Neal Mohan is ending 2025 with one of the biggest honours in global business. TIME Magazine has named him its CEO of the Year. The recognition highlights the growing role YouTube plays in shaping what billions of people watch every single day. TIME called him a cultural architect building the "diet” of global entertainment.

The profile described the video giant in a very colourful way. "Mohan is the farmer; what he cultivates will be what we eat,” TIME wrote. It added that "YouTube provides the soil, and everyone comes and plants whatever nourishing or noxious plants they care to.” That is the kind of influence Mohan is responsible for today.

Neal Mohan took over as YouTube CEO in 2023 after years of working closely with former CEO Susan Wojcicki. He has tried to maintain a steady hand on one of the internet’s biggest platforms. TIME even noted his personality saying the chief of the "world’s most powerful distraction” is "surprisingly mellow.” The magazine said he is quiet spoken and "hard to ruffle.”

He talks a lot about what drives decisions on the platform. "The fundamental North Star of how I think about content policies and moderation in general on YouTube is to give everyone a voice,” he said. That belief continues to guide YouTube’s approach as creators and viewers increase each year.

His leadership has come with big challenges too. In 2021, the platform got caught in a major legal fight after YouTube suspended former US President Donald Trump’s channel. Even after reinstating it in 2023, the lawsuit continued. Mohan helped close that long chapter this year. Under him, YouTube settled the case in September 2025 for 24.5 million dollars without admitting wrongdoing. TIME called that a key moment in his tenure.

Mohan’s life has roots in both the United States and India. He was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1973. His Tamil parents moved back to Lucknow during the mid 1980s. He learned Hindi and even studied Sanskrit. He once compared the language to programming saying "It’s incredibly phonetic and rules-oriented. It was like learning computer programming, basically.”

He later returned to the US for higher studies. Stanford University shaped his business career, where he completed both his undergraduate degree and an MBA. His early job at NetGravity took him into the tech and advertising industry. That led to his major role at DoubleClick, which Google bought for 3.1 billion dollars in 2007. That deal created the connection with Wojcicki that eventually brought him to YouTube.

Mohan is very aware of how fast entertainment is changing. "The entire dynamics of the entire media industry are changing before our eyes,” he has said. "It’s incredibly disruptive, and if you do not adapt, you can be left by the wayside.” He believes YouTube must keep evolving to stay relevant to billions of viewers.

TIME says one value stays constant throughout his journey. He wants people to be heard. His work reflects that philosophy, offering a global platform where anyone can upload their ideas, dance videos, daily vlogs, or political debates.

Away from meetings and policies, Mohan is described as someone who enjoys sports and watching his daughters perform on stage. He seems happy blending a normal family life with running one of the biggest stages on the planet.

Neal Mohan’s story connects Lucknow to Silicon Valley and shows how personal experiences often shape global influence. TIME’s CEO of the Year title simply acknowledges the reality.