Supermarket chain Tesco is drawing up succession plans for long-serving chair John Allan as he prepares to step down from his role in 2024.
According to Sky News, t he UK’s biggest retailer will kick off its search for a new chair in 2023 and is in the process of appointing an external headhunter to assist in its search.
Under UK corporate governance rules, Allan will be 'timed out' in just over a year, meaning he would no longer be regarded as an independent chairman after serving for nine years.
The search for Allan’s successor will be led internally by Byron Grote, the former BP finance chief, who will also be stepping down from Tesco’s board next year.
Allan took over as chairman in March 2015, in the aftermath of one of Tesco’s worst periods ever as the supermarket had been accused in December 2014 of inflating its profits by £250m, stated the report.
Over the past seven years, the chairman helped to stabilise the company whilst rebuilding its market share, Sky reported.
Allan, a former president of the CBI, has been an outspoken figure during his tenure as Tesco chairman, recently declaring that Labour was the only political party to have set out a credible economic growth plan. Last year, he called for ministers to urgently relax visa restrictions to avert the prospect of Brexit-related supply chain problems.
Tesco is touted as the largest food retailer in Britain. Like its rivals, it has been grappling with the impact of the pandemic and, more recently, the rampant inflation.
