LES ÉCHOS FEB 12TH
Patrick Pouyanné
Total new managing director
Total: Patrick
Pouyanné’s first hundred days
Three months and half after Christophe de Margerie’s
death, Total new managing director presents the oil group annual financial
statements for the first time this morning. Even
if he has already proven his capacity to settle the policies and to take
control in a thorny context, Patrick Pouyanné needs to win a more personal
challenge: taming his temper.
His eyes brighten, his voice shakes and
his words come less easily when he calls back the memories of that night of
October 20th, when a plane crash caused the death of Christophe de
Margerie, Total CEO. The group new managing director, who
presents the 11th world company financial statements for the first
time today, reckons: “We
were present here, waiting, in a surrealistic atmosphere. All of us felt lost… In the same time, somewhere in my
brain, I told myself my life was about to shift radically”. Thus on the
following morning at 10 am, Thierry Desmarest, the former CEO, who has been
still Total administrator, announced to Patrick Pouyanné that he will be
appointed and he asked him to keep this secret. “ I was idly all day long in my
office, I could not concentrate”, says the new boss. Emotion is not far. Behind the rugbyman-like giant, the fast
intellectual machine, there is a sensitivity on edge… which sometimes flows
over in a dramatic way.
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| Lemonde.fr |
His first weeks in Total management
don’t give him much time to muster.
Patrick Pouyanné has a
kind of obsession: showing that Total has got a firm hand
and a strong direction. To cope with all his duties, this former
student from X-Mines (highest college of France in the field of managing
industrial sectors, like mining) mobilises all this talents, among which a
Cartesian mind, perfectly shaped. “Immediately,
I started to schedule all the indispensable meetings of the first two months,
to avoid a maelstrom”, he says.
A firm-handed manager
He makes lists: which countries he must visit, who he must meet. Abroad, in France, in and outside Total. Investors, major oil producers, politicians, managers of the group. According to his reputation of a tremendous workaholic, he carries on
with decisions, meetings, travels (Abu Dhabi, Qatar, OPEC summit in Vienna,
then Russia, Angola, Nigeria, Congo, etc) in a tense run against time. “The first days, I went step by
step, focusing only on the next step”, he reckons. One of his first decisions, namely, Philippe Sauquet’s appointment at
the head of the refinery-chemicals branch, is taken in a few minutes. The handing over of office is settled in a hotel room, just before a
meeting in London. “Within
four hours, I taught him the basics of refinery-chemicals”, he smiles.
Work done. Nobody questions it today, the 100,000 staff oil group is managed by a
firm-handed man. “He has taken the helm. He decides, he solves problems”, observes a
trade union representative. The 10th December statement
made in front of the 300 first managers of Total, written by himself and spread
in the group largely, has been widely cheered. “He spoke with energy and gave
reassurances”, said a manager. “This
day, he made a highly appreciated managerial act”. Some of his decisions
aroused anger (reduction of professional travels and expenses, freeze of
employment, particularly) but the ship has got a captain.
Outside Total, Patrick Pouyanné
meets with success. In late November, his meeting with
Vladimir Putin was heralded as a great piece of work. “When you embody the company, no
choice is left to you, you just have to maintain your rank”, he reckons
simply. Carefully, he prepared the meeting (as
he always does), he took information about the Russian president’s tastes, then
drafted a plan in a few points, which, surprisingly, met perfectly with the
preliminary statement of Vladimir Putin, he reckons.
During these first weeks, Patrick
Pouyanné has to tame his temper, as he is not fashionable at all and as he does
not care to show his impatience when he notes that he is losing his time. The first time he met with an armada of journalists and photographs
after a public intervention programmed for a long time after his appointment,
he left running. “I quickly answered a question, then I escaped. That was too much”, he acknowledged . During a dinner given by Philippe
Villin, a banker, in early November, where all CAC 40 presidents and famous
politicians were heading, he suddenly discovered “many new friends”, he said ironically.
“The
function builds the man”, he keeps
repeating. “Even
if you know that managing a group like Total has nothing to do with the
responsibility of one of its major division, living it is a world else. You
find yourself immediately under the attention of the public, you become a
public man, people want to draw your portrait…!”, he sighed. Nevertheless he measured his new duties. “One of the main awareness coming
from Christophe has been to make all the group managers aware that Total is not
only an oil company, aiming at producing wealth and products. It’s also a big ship, impacting on environment, city’s
life and this dimension must be taken into account.”
On the verge of suggesting a new
governance for Total on October 21st, Thierry Desmarest came to the conclusion swiftly. “We have spoken of him with
Christophe de Margerie. Taking into account his past and all his
results, Patrick Pouyanné was the right high-level manager ready to take
over”, said Total former CEO, who has taken over the
presidency until the end of 2015. “Papou”, as it is his nickname among his
followers, has got a clear and edged intelligence, out of norms, and one of his
collaborators even qualifies this intelligence as “hallucinating”. He worked in ministerial cabinets, from this of Edouard Balladur then
that of François Fillon, he has the easy-going feature and the network to
navigate freely in France power circles. He entered the oil group in 1997 (in Elf, before the merger), he
ascended all the scales at a running pace, among the royal branch of
exploration-production and was expatriated several years, in Angola and Qatar.
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| archimede.fr |
An extremely demanding manager
His years at the head of the
refinery-chemicals branch, where Christophe de Margerie appointed him in early
2012, were decisive years. “Within
less than a three years’ time, he unified the branch, he settled back
profitability and prepared the upcoming restructuratings. He has got a true experience to share: Inside Total, for many people, the choice of the
future CEO was already decided since one year”, says an in-depth analyst of the group. Merging both refinery and petrochemicals activities, reducing costs,
Patrick Pouyanné has not ceased to handle his troops to make the accounts
profitable once again. “I was sure we could do better”, he insists. “You’ll see: on February 12th, we will publish excellent
results for the branch!”.
In the same way, his managing of Carling
vapocracking, to be closed next summer, is already heralded as the model to be
followed for other capacity reductions which shall affect the refinery sector
in France. “Everybody
told me: it’s forbidden to touch Lorraine, he reckons. But
that should be done either way.
We
anticipated, we play time to avoid brutal decision, we prepared the
redeployment of the site, we informed the staff and the politicians….” Finally, the
210 job cuts in Carling have not been difficult to manage, even making
Dunkerque refinery closure trauma already forgotten, in 2010 (before his
appointment to the direction of the branch). A staff representative does not hesitate to herald his “human qualities”.
With no doubt, his “hundred days” allow
Patrick Pouyanné to show his ability to manage during a difficult situation, in
a thorny market context where oil price fell by 60% within a six months’ time. Now he needs to confirm his own vision about the group future on the
long term. “For now, all the decisions are implementing the
strategic plan defined by Christophe de Margerie”, says an attentive observer. No need to hurry. Total new strong man, aged fifty one,
has all this time to print his personal brand.
But there is a question, which has
regularly arisen since his appointment, and which may darken the situation: As he has reached a summit, can Patrick Pouyanné master his fiery
temper? His dramatic angers are his weak point
since long, as thought Christophe de Margerie. “I saw people coming out of his
office crying. Many of his collaborators, exhausted,
did not dare to contradict him”, says a manager, who worked
with him several years ago.
Without any reluctance, Total general
manager hammers and justifies his extreme requirements to his teams. Nevertheless he acknowledges that he must pay more attention to the way
he speaks to people and he would reportedly have got some personal coaching
sessions (he refuses to confirm this nevertheless). “My temper is blastering
sometimes, too quickly”, he explains. “I know that and I pay attention.”
Nevertheless several recent testimonies show that it’s difficult to reform
one’s inner self. In December, in his statement to the 300
managers, he invited Total high-level directors to “say things straightforwardly”, and to be “audacious.” To the point to oppose to his
disconcerting explosions of anger?
Going further
