Leadership crises: a problem of performance or of expectations?

Our newspapers, TV news channels and social media regularly highlight the plight of leaders facing difficult challenges, or of organisations facing what is almost always characterised as a ‘leadership crisis’. Depending when you read this article, you will no doubt think of several examples, but we are thinking of one case in particular: the circumstances of the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, as highlighted in an FT article of 21 March.

Following a previous year that the FT had already classified as “an annus horribilis for the UK’s financial regulator”, talk of ‘leadership crisis’ is perhaps predictable: post-Panama, ‘financial conduct’ in its broadest sense is unlikely to be rarely far from the headlines.

We would, however, argue that it is predictable not just as a reflection of the seemingly endless eruption of scandals and record-breaking fines – and the current occupation of the FCA CEO’s chair by an ‘acting’ replacement for a predecessor we already know will not be re-appointed. The latter point, however, might be more telling: as with Presidents ineligible for re-election, there is another two-word phrase that the media often rush to use. Lame duck.