Blank on the long list for M&S chair
HEADHUNTERS searching for a replacement to Sir Stuart Rose at Marks and Spencer have earmarked former Lloyds chairman Sir Victor Blank as a potential candidate to chair the board.
JCA Group founder Jan Hall is currently putting together a long list of candidates ready for the board to whittle down. Other names that have been mentioned in connection with the role include Roger Carr, the erstwhile chairman of Cadbury; Niall Fitzgerald, deputy chairman of Reuters and a former chair of Unilever; and Lord Myners, the outgoing government minister who held the position between 2004 and 2006.
Blank was chairman of mail order retailer GUS prior to his stint at Lloyds, which was marred by the bank’s disastrous takeover of HBOS at the height of the crisis.
Rose, who handed over the chief executive’s job at M&S to former Morrisons man Marc Bolland earlier this month, is due to step down as chairman next March.