Equal opportunities | M&S boss Katie Bickerstaffe's £750K pay packet is a step in the right direction

M&S’ new co-Chief Executive Katie Bickerstaffe will earn a salary of £750,000 a year for a four-day week role, the British retail chain has revealed. This will mean that, pro-rata, she is earning £140,000 more than her co-Chief Executive Stuart Machin, to whom she will be reporting. Machin is on a salary of £800,000 a year.

Together with Eoin Tonge, the company’s CFO, who will take on an enlarged strategy role, Bickerstaffe and Machin are set to replace outgoing CEO Steve Rowe, who is credited with turning the business round, and bringing it into the black after the pandemic, to the tune of pre-tax profits of £392million last month compared with a loss of £209million last year. Some analysts have described the top leadership team triad as a ‘fudge’, according to, but M&S’ Chair Archie Norman has argued strongly against this, stating that the three “fly in formation”. He added that M&S requires an “unconventional” approach to leadership due to the ongoing need for turnaround work as well as the home, clothing and food businesses.

Leading on ESG

As well as improving M&S’ fortunes, Steve Rowe was an “activist CEO” who was keen for the company to take a leading role on social and environmental issues. Together with Steve Murrells, Group CEO of the Co-operative Group, and Steve Ingham, CEO of PageGroup, Rowe signed a pledge committing to putting diversity and inclusion at the top of the corporate agenda. In an open letter co-authored with Leila McKenzie-Delis (CEO of Dial Global, a global community for leaders which aims to create a more inclusive and open society) the three “activist CEOs” stated: “Together, let’s drive equity and inclusion, dismantle barriers, and empower growth and progress for the good of our society and the generations that will inherit it.”