The art and science of finding the right CEO (how Procter & Gamble built a programme to produce candidates for the post of chief executive officer)

Citation

(2012), "The art and science of finding the right CEO (how Procter & Gamble built a programme to produce candidates for the post of chief executive officer)", Human Resource Management International Digest, Vol. 20 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/hrmid.2012.04420baa.003

The art and science of finding the right CEO (how Procter & Gamble built a programme to produce candidates for the post of chief executive officer)

Article Type: Abstracts From: Human Resource Management International Digest, Volume 20, Issue 2

Lafley A.G. and Tichy N.M. Harvard Business Review (USA), October 2011, Vol. 89 No. 10, Start page: 67, No. of pages: 8

Offers a case study, based on the experience of Procter & Gamble (P&G), in building an internal leadership program designed to produce numerous candidates for the post of chief executive officer (CEO). Explains that, although choosing a new CEO is the most important job of a company’s board of directors, and no other decision has such a profound impact on a company’s strategy and performance, the topic of succession often gets sidelined by concerns that seem more pressing. Describes how A.G. Lafley worked counter to this trend by pressing the directors at P&G to begin the search for his successor as soon as he took office as CEO. Describes the rigorous processes P&G established to ensure that it would always have a pool of strong internal CEO candidates and, among other things, P&G: set up many opportunities for direct, in-depth interaction between the board and candidates; established clear leadership criteria and continually measured people against them; and developed various scenarios the company might face and identified who could best steer the firm in each situation. Records that Lafley himself took responsibility for seeing that the company developed as many potential CEOs as it could, becoming P&G’s head leadership coach, responsible for training its top 500 executives. Concludes that P&G’s disciplined approach paid off by producing not only a first-rate successor but a contingent of senior executives who have led the company to considerable growth. Includes the account in a special issue partly devoted to the theme “Spotlight on Talent”. ISSN: 0017-8012 Reference: 40AT248

Keywords: Human resource management, Recruitment, Chief executives, Directors, Senior management, Leadership, Organizations, United States of America, Case studies