When you buy shares in a company, one of the aspects is you become a voter which includes voting at the AGM for executive compensation. The vote means you should be aware of who the people are and potential successors. And this is the reason why the business news often highlights when companies change CEOs.

In an article by Ron Bousso and Sarah McFarlane of Reuters, the biggest oil company in the UK or BP is going through a new CEO process. Bernard Looney was the CEO but resigned for not disclosing a relationship with a employee and leaving no clear succession plan in place. The reality is one of the most important roles of any CEO is to create succession plans for the top executives and themselves. Not having a succession plan takes time and effort to fix and that has been part of the job of interim CEO Murray Auchincloss.

In every company, there is a people and governance committee, in BP the Chairman Helge Lund is now focused on 3 internal candidates, all members of BP leadership team. The committee is also considering external candidates. An internal appointment would signal board support for continuing BP’s current strategy. An external appointment may mean a new direction, for they tend to bring in new people to the leadership team.

Everyone on the leadership team has pros and cons and some have responsibilities that include working with outside investors, and they are more known people to analysts.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, while sometimes the thought is every company can operate on autopilot, the reality is companies are run by people. Every company has a website and that includes the CEO and leadership team along with their bios are on the website. If you buy shares in the company, you may get to meet them or hear them, and they are the people who make profits which pay dividends to you. While you are investing in a company, you are also investing in people.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.