BT 2016 Annual Report Download - page 105

BT Group plc
Annual Report 2016
110
Firstly, I am delighted to welcome Mike Inglis who joined the Board
in September 2015. Mike’s insight and in-depth experience in
the technology industry will be a great asset for BT and the Board.
Mike is also a member of the Technology Committee . I’m also
pleased to welcome Tim Höttges (CEO of Deutsche Telekom) who
we appointed to the Board, as a non-independent non-executive
director, on completion of the EE acquisition in January 2016.
We announced in March that Tony Chanmugam will be stepping
down from his role as Group Finance Director and from the Board
in July 2016. Tony will move to a short-term role continuing to
integrate EE into the group, before leaving later in the year.
Tony has delivered strong results during his career at BT and I’d like
to thank him for his tremendous hard work and commitment over
the years.
We are delighted that Simon Lowth will join the company in July
as our new Group Finance Director, and a member of the Board.
Simon brings a wealth of experience to BT; strong organisational
leadership and engineering experience at leading infrastructure
companies, as well as his strong financial acumen.
I continually review the membership of the Board and its range
of skills. We look to appoint outstanding candidates with a diverse
mix of experience, as we recognise the importance of diversity in
its widest sense in Board eectiveness. At the moment we have
27% female representation on the Board.
This has been a very full year for BT with a number of major
developments and some big decisions. It has been another very
busy year for Board members who have made themselves available
to support and engage with the management team, as and
when needed. The Board has played an active role, particularly
in relation to the acquisition of EE and the synergies and financial
elements underpinning the deal, as well as the integration of EE
into the group.
As well as our forward programme of key items, updates from
each line of business CEO and updates on customer service, this
year we had in-depth discussions on EE integration, BT TV and
BT Sport. You can read more about what we have done on pages
114 to 117.
Following last year’s triennial external Board evaluation, for
2015/16 the Company Secretary and I carried out a Board
evaluation. We discussed the report in June and noted that, overall,
the results were positive. We also identified a number of areas of
focus; you can find our actions in these areas on page 117.
We keep our governance framework under review to ensure it
enhances the Board’s ability to exercise proper oversight. We
implemented some changes for EE coming into the group which
include establishing a new
Integration Committee of the Board.
You can read more about these new aspects of governance on
page 115.
The changes in the Financial Reporting Council’s updated UK
Corporate Governance Code are eective for 2015/16. We report
against these new requirements in the following pages.
We also engage in relevant consultations as they take place as part
of the wider governance debate.
I want to thank all members of the Board for their support this year
and I believe the Board has the right range and mix of skills and
experience tokeep delivering and developing our strategy.
Sir Michael Rake
Chairman
4 May 2016
Chairman’s governance report
“This has been a landmark year for BT. I’m delighted
that we have a Board with the range of skills and
experience, to play an active role in delivering our
strategy.”
“