Neryl East – Yahoo Finance
International speaker; expert on communication, media, credibility, influence and reputation
Woolworths CEO Brad Banducci’s defiance a credibility nightmare or ‘good cop, bad cop’ tactic?
With just months left in the top job, Brad Banducci spent hours on a question a ‘student’ could answer. So, how far has he come since his last PR nightmare?
From resigning days after defiantly storming out of an interview to a fiery clash over supermarket prices that earned him a threat of jail time. Woolworths CEO Brad Banducci did nothing to salvage his credibility when he fronted the Senate over supermarket pricing, according to one expert.
Woolworths claimed a succession plan for Banducci had already been put into motion before his shambolic interview with Four Corners. So now, with the cat out of the bag and just over 19 weeks left in his tenure as chief executive, what changed?
Credibility expert Neryl East broke down his “mini-tantrum” for Yahoo Finance in February and said any strategy Woolworths had to rebuild a connection with the Australian public on Tuesday failed.
“It was never going to be a comfortable encounter for the Woolies CEO, that previous interview turned up the pressure. But I was fairly surprised by how his performance deteriorated,” she told Yahoo Finance.
“I would’ve liked to have seen just a little indication that there was a connection with people who are feeling the impacts of cost-of-living increases, where it seemed to be more of an approach of ‘let’s do what we can not to answer some of these tricky questions’.”…