Burger King gains ground as McDonald’s reshapes its U.S. business
ConocoPhillips CFO Andy O’Brien is set to take the company’s top job on Sept. 1, when CEO Ryan Lance retires after 14 years. ConocoPhillips announced the timing of the executive changes as the oil company reported its best quarterly results in four years.
The company reported $3.9 billion in profits, boosted by higher oil and fuel prices amid the Iran war. O’Brien will move into the CEO role after a long career at ConocoPhillips, where he joined in 1997 and held finance, planning and strategy positions.
O’Brien became a member of ConocoPhillips’ executive leadership team in 2022 and was named finance chief in June of last year. The company said the changes will take effect Sept. 1.
The appointment comes amid broader interest in moving finance chiefs into the top executive role. Jim Lawson, co-lead of the global financial officers practice at Russell Reynolds Associates, said CFOs regularly deal with boards and external stakeholders.
“CFOs are among the executives who most frequently face the board and external stakeholders, so they arrive at the top job already fluent in two of the constituencies that matter most,” Lawson told The Wall Street Journal. “That’s why we are seeing organizations increasingly hire CFOs as potential CEO successors from the outset.”
Russell Reynolds Associates plans to release a report on the trend in the fall. Lawson said less than half of board directors believe their CEO succession plan will succeed, while CEO tenures have reached record lows and leaders’ interest in the top job has declined significantly over the past three years.
Lawson said the modern CFO has expanded beyond a strictly financial role and can serve as an enterprise leader, with responsibility for financial and operational decisions. He said CFOs who view their role as protecting value tend to struggle as CEO candidates, while those who view it as creating value tend to succeed.
In the restaurant industry, Burger King reported a stronger quarter after changing its signature Whopper. Executives said Thursday that the revamp earlier in the year helped produce an 8.5% increase in domestic U.S. same-store sales for the three months ended June 30.
“A lot of people are saying they’re coming back for the first time in a long time,” Tom Curtis, president of Burger King’s U.S. and Canada business, said in an interview.
Burger King’s gains came as McDonald’s faced challenges in its U.S. business. Customer traffic declined after recent promotions and marketing efforts failed to meet expectations, and McDonald’s is bringing in a new U.S. president to lead a turnaround and carry out a strategy centered on improving food and service.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics also released the jobs report for July.