After nearly seven years at the helm of WPP, Mark Read has announced he will step down by the end of 2025 in an unexpected post on the platform which was once professional and is now increasingly social (LinkedIn). The race to replace the succession throne is on, with Devika Bulchandani and Emily Del Greco speculated as the top internal contenders.
Read’s legacy is also an interesting question: on one side he was a stable hand, but as ADOTAT’s Pesach Lattin ➡️ adotat noted, whoever takes his chair faces some real challenges.
Oh and of course Sir Martin Sorrell couldn’t resist having a shot at Read on the way out.
Why this matters
There is much that matters on this announcement.
Firstly, the use of LinkedIn as the media platform of choice for the CEO of a publicly listed company to announce his resignation. There was a time when this was handled by a team of comms advisers and staged-managed through the media.
Which brings me to the second point:, the ability of WPP to mismanage the timing of these major announcements. It was only two weeks ago that we discussed the apparent mismanagement of the GroupM name change to WPP Media, and now we have the announcement that the Global CEO is resigning, with no obvious successor or succession plan in place. There is never a good time, but with so much uncertainty, the timing will not instil confidence in the market.
This brings us to the third and final point: the speculation about who will succeed Mr Read. I first saw the news on a WhatsApp group of pitch consultants from around the world. (Yes, there is such a thing.) Following the initial shock and discussions on the obvious reasons, the conversation turned to speculation about who would take over the Iron Throne. Names mentioned include T&P’s Johnny Hornby, Ogilvy’s Devika Bulchandani , her UK colleague James Murphy, VML’s Jon Cook, Google’s Matt Brittin and even Omnicom’s Troy Rahunen. I guess we will all just have to wait.
– A snippet from TrinityP3 for FIVE. A curated newsletter of the five things you need to read this week.
Darren Woolley
Shared by Darren Woolley, Founder of TrinityP3, our partners in Asia. With his background as analytical scientist and creative problem solver, Darren brings unique insights and learnings to the marketing process. He is considered a global thought leader on agency remuneration, search and selection and relationship optimization.