When I flew from London to Melbourne the other week, Sir Keir Starmer was still leading the UK Labour Party, which he took to a landslide election victory 18 months ago.
In Australia, opposition leader Sussan Ley was still heading the 82-year-old centre-right Liberal Party that made her its first female leader nine months ago.
But only just. Grim poll numbers and circling rivals had left both dangerously close to joining the prematurely ejected leaders who have come to haunt both countries.
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On Friday, Ley was abruptly toppled in a party room vote that made Angus Taylor, a former McKinsey consultant, the Liberals’ fifth leader in eight years. Starmer staved off a coup days earlier, saving the UK from its fifth prime minister in four years – for the moment.
This turmoil is not unique to politics. The upper ranks of business are facing their own form of upheaval.
Chief executive turnover in the world’s largest listed companies reached a new record for the second year in a row in 2025, rising 16 per cent from 2024, and 21 per cent above an eight-year average tracked by headhunter Russell Reynolds.
The length of time chief executives stay in the job has fallen to an average of seven years, down from just over eight years in 2021.
Many exits last year were part of planned, orderly handovers, though few enjoyed the path of Berkshire Hathaway’s Greg Abel. He took over from the legendary Warren Buffett last month, more than four years after Buffett named him as his successor.
Things were far more unruly elsewhere. Nestlé’s Laurent Freixe lasted just a year before he was fired for failing to disclose a romantic relationship with a subordinate. Kohl’s, the US department store chain, removed Ashley Buchanan less than four months into his tenure for allegedly breaching conflict-of-interest policies involving outside vendors.
But internal strife was not the only reason why the share of chief executives departing within 30 to 36 months rose by nearly 80 per cent in the space of a year.
There was also pressure from results-hungry shareholder activists who launched what Barclays Bank says was a record 255 campaigns worldwide in 2025.
In the United States, 32 chief executives resigned within one year of an activist campaign, a 40 per cent increase on the four-year average.
Still, impatient shareholders do not entirely explain the chief executive churnover, which has risen even at top-performing firms. Business and political leaders alike have been roiled by a daunting mix of forces that show little sign of easing.
Wars in the Middle East and Europe were unsettling enough before a volatile US president began to upend global trade, and a new breed of companies threatened to turn ever more jobs and industries into artificial intelligence roadkill.
As Donald Trump’s tumultuous second term began last year, chief executive exits in the US rose to the highest level recorded in more than 20 years by Challenger, Gray and Christmas, an outplacement firm that tracks chief executive hiring trends.
Moreover, as boards seek the right leaders for mercurial times, a growing number have put off a final decision and instead plumped for interim chief executive appointments.
Challenger found 15 per cent of new chief executives were interim in the first six months of 2025, compared to 9 per cent in the same period a year earlier.
In the face of ever more complex demands, many executives are taking short-term appointments in what Challenger has called a “CEO [chief executive] gig economy”.
The flexibility this offers is obviously appealing. But a boss who could be out the door tomorrow is also a recipe for morale-sapping discontent, not least for managers trying to figure out strategic priorities.
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Added to this, even when new chief executives are permanent, a growing number are company outsiders, not known internal quantities.
External hires accounted for a third of S&P 500 chief executive successions last year, nearly double the share in 2024 and the highest level in eight years.
The appeal of a fresh-eyed leader who can navigate the mushrooming uncertainties of modern business life is obvious – up to a point.
But a world in which shareholders, or voters, end up dispatching ever more disposable leaders at an ever faster pace will not necessarily be a happy one. I have worked for companies led by a revolving cast of outsiders brought in to shake things up, and others overseen by seasoned insiders given time to pursue long-term results. The latter was easily preferable.
Leaders who move fast and break things can accomplish much. Those who go slower and fix things can end up doing even more. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited
