Negotiations over a potential purchase of Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena inevitably attracted most attention during Andrea Orcel’s first year at UniCredit. The fall in the latter’s share price after the news in October that the deal was not going ahead indicates how much the market changed its attitude to that long-discussed deal since Orcel’s arrival in April.
Before deciding his strategy for the years ahead, though, Orcel’s priority has been to make sure that his team is properly structured and staffed. Changes were sorely needed, in his view, to reduce complexity and to make sure there was less doubt as to where responsibilities lay and that the bankers overseeing UniCredit’s most important markets should be more empowered, especially at a country level.
One of his first actions, a month after he joined, was to cut the number of executives almost by half, to 15. In doing so, he largely dismantled the elaborate co-head structure that his predecessor, Jean Pierre Mustier, had put in place across much of the top and mid level of management.
As part of this, Orcel elevated Niccolò Ubertalli to head of Italy, by far UniCredit’s most important country. Under Mustier, Italy had been separated out, but only under two co-heads of Italy commercial banking. These appeared lower in seniority to the two co-heads of Western Europe commercial banking. Orcel axed this Western Europe layer, leading to the exits of Francesco Giordano and Olivier Khayat, a former colleague of Mustier from his days at Societe Generale.
“I had 27 direct reports, which was just too many,” Orcel tells Euromoney. “It wasn’t about the people; it was about creating an efficient and effective set of reporting lines. Our business focus changed, and our managerial structure also needed to change to reflect that.”
Four new executives have therefore joined from outside the group, heading various reformed functions. Three of these previously worked under Orcel when he was head of UBS’ investment bank, including Fiona Melrose, group strategy and optimization head. Melrose’s most recent bank role had been to work on Banco Santander’s strategy in 2019.
I had 27 direct reports, which was just too many
Andrea Orcel
Other executives kept their old jobs, however, including chief financial officer Stefano Porro, chief risk officer TJ Lim, and head of corporate and investment banking Richard Burton.
The reshuffles and new appointments continued further down the organization, often to roles overseeing businesses that were previously amalgamated and run by co-heads.
In September, for example, the bank hired Sam Kendall, another former lieutenant to Orcel at UBS. He is now in charge of UniCredit’s investment-banking advisory and capital markets activities, with former co-head of financing and advisory Goffredo Guizzardi focusing on loans.
But UniCredit’s story is no longer just about shoring up what it had before. The restructured executive committee includes a new digital division in recognition of the importance of technology to the future of banking. Orcel hired Jingle Pang to head this unit, having been impressed by her experience in helping transform legacy financial institutions, notably at China’s Ping An Technology.
