Good morning. I’ve got succession on the brain, and for once, it’s not of the Tomlette/Greggs variety. No, this time it’s CEOs—specifically the boomerang variety.
Disney said this week that it would (again) replace Bob Iger as CEO, with a target of 2026. Which got me thinking: How have successors to boomerang CEOs fared?
Tim Cook followed Steve Jobs’ now legendary return, and Apple’s doing better than anyone dreamed. Parag Agrawal followed Jack Dorsey’s second tour at the company formerly known as Twitter, only to be digitally defenestrated by Elon Musk. Laxman Narasimhan took over from Howard Schultz at Starbucks and was shown the door 16 months later. Vlad Kliatchko replaced Michael Bloomberg at Bloomberg LP, but he’s barely a year in. Ditto Matt Baer, who took over from Katrina Lake at Stitch Fix.
Meanwhile: Michael Dell remains atop his namesake company; Sam Altman returned to OpenAI; Kevin Plank boomeranged back to Under Armour. All three are founders; all three are a generation (or more) away from Iger’s 73 years.
What’s it all mean? That if you’re in the business of following a returning Logan Roy, you better make one helluva Tomlette. —Andrew Nusca
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