Comment: M&S’s reshuffle raises questions on succession

Marks & Spencer perhaps flagged the shape of things to come for retail more widely when it rejigged top management responsibilities this week.

The extension of multichannel boss Laura Wade-Gery’s responsibilities makes M&S one of the few – maybe the only – retailers to create a leadership structure that explicitly reflects the shift to digital.

“The subtext to the rejig is what it says about who might eventually succeed Bolland”

Chris Brook-Carter, editor-in-chief

In a landmark moment for M&S, its stores now have the status of a channel – albeit still the main channel – among others such as mobile and ecommerce. Retail director Sacha Berendji will now report to Wade-Gery.

The change makes concrete M&S chief executive Marc Bolland’s famous comment that the retailer’s website has succeeded ‘the Arch’ on Oxford Street as its flagship store.

The fascinating subtext to the rejig is what it says about who might eventually succeed Bolland.

Wade-Gery’s enhanced role reinforces her position among the frontrunners. However, some question why that should be the case, and point to the time it’s taking for the retailer’s new web platform to bed in – M&S flagged that first-quarter general merchandise performance will be affected by the transition.

But what channels a retailer sells through make not the slightest difference if the product on offer does not tickle the shopper’s fancy.

From that perspective if general merchandise boss John Dixon, who re-established M&S’s food division as a rip-roaring success, can repeat the performance in clothing then his already high currency will rise further.

The wild card in the pack is Patrick Bousquet-Chavanne. The dapper Frenchman has gradually taken on a greater remit since joining two years ago and this week added international responsibilities to his portfolio.

So when the retailer holds its AGM next Tuesday, when it will also update on trading, there will be more interest than ever in the body language of the board members for clues about what the future might hold.

Whether M&S’s new division of responsibilities is the right one nobody yet knows. But, once again, other retailers will be looking at themselves and their options through the lens provided by M&S.

And across the industry, retail directors with ambitions to become chief executives will be wondering whether that has just become a little less straightforward a step than it might have been in the past.