The CEO Series with Roger Parry CBE : Hiring the CEO
Hiring a chief executive is a ‘make or break’ point for many companies, and an essential duty of the board. Roger Parry CBE convenes this special session unpacking effective approaches to leadership selection.
This is the first in our ‘CEO Series’, examining the relationship between chief executives and non-executive boards at key inflection points.
The criteria for selecting a new chief executive are broadly the same whether the candidates are internal or external but the search for a new CEO should be underway long before the current one is anywhere close to leaving. It is an on-going corporate process.
Most board Chairs and non-executive directors will have to involve themselves in the search for a CEO at some time. The average listed company CEO tenure in the UK is just over five years, in the US just over 6.
Roger brings 25 years of being on public company boards involving more than a dozen CEO searches, as well as having been a candidate himself on a few occasions.
Roger Parry has served as a chair for more than 20 years. He was previously chair of Future Publishing, Johnston Press, Clear Channel International, MSQ Partners, and Shakespeare’s Globe, and currently chairs YouGov plc and Oxford Metrics plc, and sits on the board of Uber UK.
Earlier in his career, he was a McKinsey consultant and a journalist. He has also published six books, most recently Anticipating Disruption: Boards should ask: What If…?, not just Why…?
Speakers
Sarah is non-executive Chair of Yeo Valley, Bionic, Riverford, NatureMetrics and Chelsea Physic Garden. Alongside her non-executive roles, Sarah is a Senior Advisor at Omers Private Equity and a consultant Board advisor on strategy, leadership and digital transformation. She has held a number of other non-executive roles including at Inspired Energy plc, the Institute of Physics Publishing and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Dr Tomas is an international authority in people analytics, talent management, leadership development, and the human–AI interface. His work focuses on building science-based tools that improve organisations’ ability to predict performance and individuals’ ability to understand themselves.
He is currently Chief Science Officer at Russell Reynolds and outgoing Chief Innovation Officer at ManpowerGroup. He is also co-founder of DeeperSignals and Metaprofiling, and Professor of Business Psychology at University College London and Columbia University. Previously, he has held academic positions at New York University and the London School of Economics, and has lectured at Harvard Business School, Stanford Graduate School of Business, London Business School, Johns Hopkins, IMD, and INSEAD. He was also CEO of Hogan Assessment Systems.
He has written 15 books and more than 200 scientific papers on talent, leadership, innovation, and AI, making him one of the most prolific social scientists of his generation. His work has been recognised by the American Psychological Association, the International Society for the Study of Individual Differences, and the Society for Industrial-Organisational Psychology, where he is a Fellow. He is also a Thinkers50-ranked thought leader.
Dr. Tomas is the founding director of the Industrial-Organisational and Business Psychology programme at University College London and Chief Psychometric Advisor to Harvard’s Entrepreneurial Finance Lab.
Over the past 20 years, he has advised organisations across financial services (JP Morgan, HSBC, Goldman Sachs), advertising (Google, WPP, BBH), media (BBC, Red Bull, Twitter, Spotify), consumer goods (Unilever, PepsiCo, P&G), fashion (LVMH, Net-a-Porter, Valentino, Gucci), government (British Army, Royal Mail, NHS), and intergovernmental organisations (United Nations, International Rescue Committee, World Bank).
His media presence includes more than 200 TV appearances on outlets such as the BBC, CNN, TED, and Sky, and over 300 written features in publications including Harvard Business Review, The Guardian, Fast Company, Forbes, and The Huffington Post. He is also a keynote speaker for the Institute of Economic Affairs.
Born and raised in the Villa Freud district of Buenos Aires, he has spent most of his professional career in London and New York.