Interim Chief Executive Officer — Business Model Repositioning

Strategic and operating judgement sought

Applicants should discuss an attractive proposal they narrowed or rejected after testing its assumptions. Experience managing an existing business while building a different future model is especially relevant. The role requires decisive leadership without treating confidence as a substitute for evidence.

Test what the business should become

Take executive responsibility for repositioning an operating business whose offer, economics or route to market requires a fresh direction. The assignment combines strategic judgement with implementation. The CEO must establish a supportable proposition and manage the transition without abandoning current obligations or assuming that future growth will automatically fund the change.

Examine customer demand, competitive alternatives, delivery capability and cash requirements. Identify which existing strengths are transferable and which capabilities must be built or obtained. Separate a change in positioning from a change in the underlying business model; a new description does not resolve an unsuitable cost structure or weak customer economics.

Develop a limited set of choices with explicit assumptions and consequences. Where uncertainty is material, design a practical test before committing the full organisation. Ensure the test can disprove the proposal as well as support it.

Lead the transition within the investment mandate

Translate the approved direction into commercial priorities, operating changes and investment stages. Assign ownership of benefits and track transition costs separately from ordinary performance. Protect the capabilities required to serve existing customers while making deliberate decisions about activities that no longer fit.

Lead the management team through changing responsibilities and resolve conflicting priorities. Bring material departures from the agreed investment case to the governing body. The interim CEO holds executive authority within the mandate; reserved strategic and capital decisions remain subject to board or ownership approval.

The evidence needed for continuation

Handover must show which parts of the new model have been demonstrated, what remains uncertain and what further commitments depend on. Leave managers capable of operating the revised business and a review process tied to its critical assumptions.

Success is a commercially coherent direction supported by operating evidence and disciplined implementation. The permanent leader should inherit a business with clearer choices and viable economics, rather than an ambitious narrative whose essential dependencies remain unresolved.