The Bolland boardroom backlash
More senior figures face the axe at M&S
MARC Bolland’s surprise exit from Marks and Spencer could trigger the departure of two of his most prominent female executives and a boardroom reshuffle.
The appointment of clothing boss Steve Rowe as the next chief executive of Britain’s biggest clothing retailer means director Laura Wade- Gery – widely tipped as the heir apparent – has been passed over.
Wade- Gery was i n charge of ‘multi-channel’, which meant she oversaw the shops and online business. She is currently taking a year’s maternity leave but sources last night suggested it was unlikely she would return.
Fiercely ambitious, Oxford-educated Wade-Gery, 50, had been previously lined up as the main internal candidate to replace Bolland.
However, the firm’s nomination committee selected M&S lifer Rowe – who started working at the firm as a Saturday boy aged 15 – to replace Bolland in April.
Former Debenhams chief executive Belinda Earl, who is now style director at M&S and was hired to pep up its fashion ranges, is also expected to part company with the firm. A Bolland appointment, she has failed to kick-start sales growth in the struggling clothing arm.
Separate to this, Rowe is expected to shake up the main board.
It currently comprises five executives, which is top heavy for a FTSE 100 firm. They typically contain just a chief executive and finance director with the remainder non-executives. He is thought to favour slimming this down and merging some of the roles.
This may mean the finance director’s role expanded to become a chief operating officer, which includes overseeing logistics and IT. The separate positions for food and clothing could evolve into one product director position.
The rationale is understood to be that it could speed up the decisionmaking process, allowing it to respond quicker to rivals.
Bolland steps down following a dire Christmas trading update in which he blamed the weather and poor availability of some items for a 5.8pc fall in third-quarter cloth- ing sales. It brings to an end a turbulent six-year tenure in which the Dutchman failed to bring M&S’s clothing back into fashion. However he was credited with modernising the firm’s distribution systems, warehouses and technology.
The shares initially spiked higher on news of his departure but closed up 0.5p at 439.2p. This was in a market that saw the FTSE 100 fall 119.3 points to 5954.08.
Bolland claimed that he had always wanted to leave around now and that his departure was not linked to the trading update. ‘I had made my decision to retire at the outset,’ he said. ‘I always saw this as a five- to six-year term. Last summer I spoke to the board and informed them of my wish to retire and they have been supportive of my decision. I have not seen any pressure from shareholders.’
He will step down in April but remain at the firm until the end of June to help with the handover.
He is expected to leave with a pay package of around £3m and will continue on the boards of Coca-Cola and Unicef.
However analysts are sceptical about the timing of the announcement. Jon Copestake, retail analyst at The Economist Intelligence Unit, said: ‘Although M&S claim that Marc Bolland’s departure has been planned for years, the poor performance of its clothing division, despite a number of strategic changes and appointments, must have weighed on the decision to leave now.’
But the festive update was not all bad news. By contrast, M&S said its food business enjoyed its best ever Christmas with sales up 0.4pc, a 25th straight quarterly rise.