Archie Norman: can the turnaround king save M&S?

Archie Norman is a retail grandee with a reputation for rescuing sinking ships. There were hopes he might do the same for Britain’s national high-street institution, but his old magic may be failing him.

Archie Norman © Adrian Brooks/Imagewise

(Image credit: Archie Norman © Adrian Brooks/Imagewise)

Archie Norman began his retail career at Woolworths, rising to become the youngest finance director in the FTSE 100. Yet that moment of triumph, if remembered at all, has sadly been eclipsed by the ignominy of his current position as chairman of Marks & Spencer (M&S), which has just been kicked off London's blue-chip index. The demotion is a big psychological blow for the 135-year-old national institution. It also piles pressure on Norman a "retail grandee" renowned for pulling off "resuscitation jobs". When he arrived two years ago, there were high hopes that he might restore M&S to its former glories, says The Sunday Times. But its shares have since fallen 37% to a 20-year low and analysts have begun muttering that this time "the turnaround king" might have "bitten off more than he can chew".

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Jane writes profiles for MoneyWeek and is city editor of The Week. A former British Society of Magazine Editors editor of the year, she cut her teeth in journalism editing The Daily Telegraph’s Letters page and writing gossip for the London Evening Standard – while contributing to a kaleidoscopic range of business magazines including Personnel Today, Edge, Microscope, Computing, PC Business World, and Business & Finance.

She has edited corporate publications for accountants BDO, business psychologists YSC Consulting, and the law firm Stephenson Harwood – also enjoying a stint as a researcher for the due diligence department of a global risk advisory firm.

Her sole book to date, Stay or Go? (2016), rehearsed the arguments on both sides of the EU referendum.

She lives in north London, has a degree in modern history from Trinity College, Oxford, and is currently learning to play the drums.