Archie Norman is one of Britain’s leading businessmen with a long term track record of business change and value creation. He has led transformations of major British businesses in the UK and abroad, served on the Boards of several others, and built strong management teams who are now in leading positions in several major British companies.  Archie has also served as a Member of Parliament for eight years and worked at the highest level in British politics.

Archie was a member of a three strong team that established and built Kingfisher plc in the 1980s to become Britain’s leading general merchandise retailer. In 1991 he took over as Chief Executive of Asda. Over the subsequent eight years the business was transformed into the second largest supermarket group before being sold to Wal-Mart for an eight times multiple of the starting share price. In 2002, Archie acquired Energis, Britain’s third largest telecoms business, on behalf of the creditor banks and over four years refocused and rebuilt the business before agreeing a sale to Cable and Wireless for double the original enterprise value.

Archie was Chairman of ITV from January 2010 until May 2016. He restructured the Board and recruited Adam Crozier as Chief Executive, and a new executive team, to lead a five year transformation plan. Operating performance improved and profit before tax quadrupled. After six and a half years he stood down as Chairman of ITV in 2016 handing the role to his successor who he had recruited to the Board. From 2013 to 2019 he served as Chairman of Lazard UK and sat on the Deputy Chairman’s Committee for Lazard worldwide. September 2019 – December 2023 he was appointed Special Advisor to the Lazard Global CEO. October 2016–August 2020 he served as Lead Non Executive Director at the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. In 2017 he was appointed Chairman of Marks and Spencer plc. In September 2020 Archie was appointed Chairman of Signal AI, one of the UK’s fastest growing companies that is transforming how business leaders make sense of the world’s information. In February 2021, he was appointed Advisor to Global Counsel, a strategic advisory business which helps companies and investors manage risk and see opportunities in politics, regulation and public policy. In September 2021 he was appointed as Senior Independent Director to the Board of Bridgepoint.

Archie is the first and only Footsie 100 Chairman to be elected a Member of Parliament, where he served for eight years, including as Chief Executive of the Conservative Party and as a leading member of the Shadow Cabinet. He led the first stages of the reform of the Conservative Party after the 1997 electoral defeat and rose to become the opposite number to the Deputy Prime Minister. Subsequently he co-founded the well known think tank “Policy Exchange.”

Archie has served as a non executive director on the Board of a number companies including British Rail, Railtrack and Geest. He was previously the youngest partner at McKinsey and Co and has an MBA from Harvard Business School and an MA from Cambridge University.