FTSE-100 gets fourth woman FD

Burberry’s promotion to the FTSE-100 on September 7 takes the count of female FDs in the index to four, as the high-fashion label’s FD Stacey Cartwright joins the likes of 3i’s Julia Wilson.

Burberry had been on the FTSE reserve list of companies who could go into the index at its quarterly reshuffle on September 9, but actually moved up two days before the reshuffle in a separate action, replacing Thomson Reuters which was deleted from the index.

Cartwright is now one of four women FDs in the FTSE-100 alongside 3i’s Julia Wilson, Cairn Energy’s Jann Brown and Friends Provident’s Evelyn Bourke – and she is one of the best-paid women, as our 2009 FD salary survey reveals.
Having joined in 2004 from Egg, Prudential’s internet bank operation, Cartwright oversaw Burberry’s 2006 IPO when it split from parent company GUS. In an exclusive interview with Financial Director in 2007, she revealed how she had led the overhaul of Burberry’s finance and accounting systems to return some £20m in savings.

Other FDs that did well out of the FTSE-100 shuffle are Rentokil’s Michael Murray, Whitbread’s Christopher Rogers and Segro’s David Sleath.

Promotion to the FTSE-100 in the most severe recession for generations reflects the work put in by Rentokil’s Murray since he joined the troubled pest control business in January this year from security outfit GSL, which he left when it was bought by security contractor group G4L last December. Alongside chief executive Alan Brown, who himself only joined from ICI last April, Murray reduced the company’s debt burden and moved it away from the threat of further profit warnings - of which it had four in 2008.

Ex-FD for Woolworths and Comet Group, Whitbread’s Christopher Rogers moves in to the top index as rumours abound that he is on a shortlist of candidates to replace the leisure group’s CEO, Alan Parker, if he retires soon as is expected. Rogers would be competing for the role with the likes of former Boots CEO Richard Baker, who joined the business in September as a non-executive director, Premier Inn head Patrick Dempsey and Carl Leaver, who had run Whitbread’s Travel Inn and the Marriott Country Club businesses before becoming head of international at Marks & Spencer, a role he quit unexpectedly this May despite being in the frame to succeed Sir Stuart Rose.

Segro FD David Sleath is one to watch after he helped take the property business into the big league by securing the acquisition of real estate investment trust Brixton this summer for £165.5m ­ moving at the right time to get a very good price and wiping Segro’s arch-rival off the map. Sleath is only on his second job in business having been FD for automotive engineering group Wagon,­ which filed for bankruptcy last Christmas,­ until 2005. He had a 17-year career with Arthur Andersen previous to that where, by the time he left in 1999, he was a partner and head of audit and assurance for the Midlands.

This article is updated with a correction to information on Stacey Cartwright and Burberry.
Read our interview with Burberry FD Stacey Cartwright ­
Read our analysis of Rentokil FD Michael Murray’s arrival