Tony Crocker, The chastened CEO of E.on, heads for the media studio circuit to be grilled on the failings in the company following the record £12m penalty for systematic mis-selling
The BBC interviewed Mr Crocker as a follow-up to its own reporting on the fine:
Energy giant E.On is to pay a record £12m penalty following an investigation into mis-selling by the industry regulator. Ofgem has carried out a series of mis-selling investigations, and in December imposed a £3.5m penalty on Npower. Ofgem says E.On’s penalty is the biggest supplier pay-out to customers, reflecting the extensive rule breaches, both on the doorstep and by telephone. The energy supplier apologised for the “completely unacceptable” failings.
Moderated contrition
At an interview on BBC Five Live radio [16th May 2014], a well-prepared Tony Crocker just about managed to balance contrition with rejection of accusations of leading an ethically corrupt company engaged in a sanctioned policy of misleading customers to agree poor deals.
The great leader arrives
Utility Week had produced a sympathetic and admiring profile less than a year ago [September, 2013].
The story reads as ‘clever but nice guy comes in, quickly sees weaknesses in company’s relationship with its customers, sets up participative ‘listening scheme’ which fixes the problems’:
Tony Cocker is not your typical chief executive. Down-to-earth, friendly, fiercely intelligent, he doesn’t seem to possess the ego that usually goes hand-in-hand with a corner office. That may be why he was able to so quickly perceive that something was very wrong with the relationship between UK energy suppliers and their customers when he returned from a stint in Eon’s German HQ to take the reins in 2011.
Cocker decided that the situation called for a total reset of Eon’s relationship with its customers, and in January 2012 launched the “Reset” programme to do just that. A six-month initiative entailed a 28,000-strong customer panel, intense research with frontline staff and the launch of the customer council.
Eon drafted in business big shot and former Asda chief executive Allan Leighton to chair the council, who was not a man to compromise. Staff across the business, from the front line to Cocker himself, reported back to Leighton and the council, having what Cocker calls with a smile “very challenging discussions”.
By the end of the Reset period, Cocker had fully assembled his management team and board, and they were ready to plan further ahead. “We spent some time with our teams reviewing our strategy off the back of Reset. What we’d inherited as a team was a much more complicated set of strategies. It was 57 pages and simplified it down to one page, [which could be summed up as] “becoming our customers’ trusted energy partners”.
The article ended with a quote from Mr Cocker saying his plans were progressing nicely:
I would say we’ve made good progress, so come back and let’s have a chat in a year’s time. We’ll be there, eager to see if doing the right thing can really translate to a competitive advantage in today’s stormy energy market.”
Before Utility Week had a chance to accept his offer, Mr Crocker is admitting his plans are not progressing as smoothly as he would have liked.
Five down and one to go
To date, the industry regulator has found five of the six major energy suppliers in the UK to have been in breach of regulations and fined them accordingly. A spokeswoman indicated that their investigations are not completed, so the ‘one’ remaining supplier is not necessary operating to higher ethical standards.
Outrage and the path to reputational hell
Politicians and the media in the UK are finding the utility companies a convenient set of targets for their sense of moral outrage. Public sentiment retains enough loathing of greed and corruption among the privileged to have some to spare for leaders of our private and public organizations. Regardless of his good intentions, Mr Crocker has a long road to ridding himself and his company of the on-going damage to their intertwined identities.
Click for regular updates
Leaders We Deserve 