Many big businesses, as of late, have been installing independent chairman who were previously CEOs elsewhere to help out with their companies. This is certainly happening more in troubled companies, but isn’t exclusively occurring in these locations. A governance research firm called The Corporate Library, said that 46 former CEOs are chairmen of other companies, up from 14 in 2004.
Dennis Carey, a senior client partner at recruiters Korn/Ferry International says, “These chairmen are strategic equal partners of the CEO because they already demonstrated a successful ‘in the trenches’ style of management.”
At Delphi Automotive LLP, for instance, John “Jack” Krol was named in 2009 as an outside chairman of this auto-parts company. He was working on the daily matters of the company, and helped to adise Delphi CEO Rodney O’Neal on his 2010 and 2011 operational plans. A Delphi spokesman says that Mr. O’Neal views the new chairman “as a partner and coach.”