Angela Ahrendts is officially out as CEO of Burberry, replaced by Christopher Bailey, after giving six months notice last October ahead of her new role as SVP of Apple Retail. Burberry’s leadership page now reflects the change and Reuters reports the change in leadership was made official today as yesterday was Ahrendts’ last day in the CEO role.
After first only sharing that Angela Ahrendts would join Apple in the spring of this year, Tim Cook specified last week during Apple’s earnings call with analysts and investors that Ahrendts would indeed be joining the company sometime this week. Ahrendts is slated to lead both the Apple Retail Store and Apple Online Store in her new position at the company. Despite the official role change, Ahrendts’ LinkedIn bio still reflects her former role (but, hey, it’s still early on day one of being out).
Now that she has officially stepped down from her role as CEO of Burberry, her photo joining the boys’ club that is the Apple leadership page is imminent. Almost comical is that Ahrendts’ photo should sit next to Apple CEO Tim Cook’s photo where the last failed head of retail John Browett’s photo was once listed (as SVP photos are shown alphabetically by last name following the CEO role).
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Our future CEO. So proud. She’s going to be the closest to Steve Jobs Apple has ever had for a CEO. I am profusely proud of Tim Cook for choosing this incredible person.
Watch her Ted talk, she’s quite a compelling person.
Angela has transformed Burberry not only on the “shop floor” and digital media, but what I admire the most is her management approach, including her work place empathy, encouragement of team building and collaboration. Some of the critical success factors in achieving harmony, which empowers staff to look after number one – the client. How many retailers these days forget the reason why they are in existence?