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o-op CEO Shirine Khoury-Haq is having "a week from hell". This isn't down to any problem with the business. It's all about her first appearance on Good Morning Britain, fielding tricky questions on whether current egg shortages are due to supermarkets underpaying their farmers and explaining why the retailer has ditched a glossy Christmas TV ad to highlight food poverty. And now, she is "being grilled" as she puts it, by The Grocer.
"I am far happier getting lost in an Excel spreadsheet than being on television," Khoury-Haq jokes. And no wonder, after a career spent largely in operational and financial roles with IBM, McDonald's and the insurance sector. But after almost seven months in the Co-op Group CEO role, it does feel like she is growing into the position of a high-profile figurehead.
Khoury-Haq was elevated on an interim basis to the top job in May after predecessor Steve Murrells left. Only in August was she confirmed as CEO. The delay was so everyone could "try before they buy", she admits. "I knew there were big things we needed to do at Co-op and I needed to gauge the appetite for doing those."
She doesn't hold back. "We needed to cut costs. We needed to remodel ourselves financially. We needed to be much more commercially focused and to reduce debt. There were big operational changes needed to make that happen and I also felt we needed a new strategy."
Assured that she would get the support she needed Khoury-Haq says she got straight to work. It's taken tough decisions. As well as halting or slowing down some significant investment plans, 400 roles were cut through a round of redundancies at its Angel Square HQ in a major cost-cutting initiative.
"Our head office costs were too high," she says. "We had to address that and decided to do that very openly, very collaboratively - and quickly. So you can imagine leading up to the consultation morale isn't great... but now we have gotten over that period I am hearing positive messages and people seem incredibly energised about where we are going. They are understanding the vision and they are seeing successes along the way."
Delivering on cost-cutting pledges hasn't been the Co-op's greatest strength...