BP chief executive Tony Hayward is already being lined up for a top corporate job after he stands down as the oil giant’s boss in October, it was reported yesterday.
Institutional investors were said to have held secret talks aimed at easing his way to another senior role.
Mr Hawyard said at the end of July he was heading for BP’s exit door, claiming he had been “demonised and vilified” in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico disaster.
He is making way for managing director Bob Dudley, who has been at the helm of BP’s response to the environmental crisis since the middle of June.
Investors are upset that Mr Hayward has become BP’s fall-guy and believe he could become a chief executive or chairman at another multinational within 18 months, said yesterday’s report.
Mr Hayward, who was criticised for a series of PR blunders at BP, leaves the oil firm with a pay-off of one year’s salary – £1.045million – and an £11million pension pot.
He will be on BP’s board until the end of November and as a non-executive director of the company’s TNK-BP Russian joint venture.