The "did he jump or was he pushed" departure of Brian Hartzer, the CEO of WestPac Banking Corporation in Australia after it became known that it had more than 23 million cases in which it did not act correctly under counter-money laundering laws is the latest example of a CEO going from his job under a cloud. In the past, that's usually been an end to at least some of the discussion. But this time it's different. This time the failures were so big and so fundamental that it calls into question conduct of the entire organisation including the full board and much of the management structure. It also raises something else. In large, complex, highly regulated groups, is the role of CEO too big for one person? As the financial services sector moves inexorably (and I would argue rightly) towards personal responsibility, is it time to review where responsibility lies in relation to specific areas of management.
