Graham Wallace

Working with Merryck to help CEOs “build successful businesses and lead fulfilling lives” is Graham’s current focus. Joining Merryck in 2006 represented a significant change to Graham’s previous CEO role when he spent four years running Cable and Wireless plc during a period of unprecedented turmoil in the global telecommunications industry. Cable and Wireless’ survival, at a time when many competitors failed financially, was due to his radical financial restructuring. He took a heavily indebted company, over £4 billion of net debt in 1999, and after returning over £3 billion to shareholders, left it with net cash of £2 billion in 2003. After 35 years of fairly continuous success and regular promotions, reaching the age of 55 prompted the decision to take a complete break from the corporate world. Much of this sabbatical was occupied in successfully completing a Masters degree in History. This was a particular challenge for a graduate engineer and qualified accountant who had not studied academically for 30 years. Before then, Graham’s career included the role of CEO of Cable and Wireless Communications where he led the merger of four companies, listed the company on the New York and London Stock Exchanges, successfully launched the world’s first digital cable television service, and presided over a trebling of the company’s share price by the time it was restructured in 1999. This was preceded by 11 years at Granada starting as Finance Director then successively CEO of Granada’s two biggest divisions. His first appointment as CEO was made by Gerry Robinson - Graham was the only executive director to survive Gerry’s revamp of the Board - and he learnt all he knows about delegating from Gerry. Graham has also held a number of non-executive directorships including at BSkyB and Barclays. As a firm believer that high performance often results from being pushed into a “zone of discomfort”, he has relished the new challenges at Merryck & Co to use his experience of success and even occasional failure to help others to achieve their full and sometimes unexpected potential.