I’ve been on the gossip circuit lately, asking people what’s holding up Hunter Harrison’s appointment as chief executive officer of Canadian Pacific. The hotly contested election of CP directors was five weeks ago, and the faction promising to bring Harrison out of retirement elected all seven of its nominees by overwhelming majorities and clearly won a mandate to install the management it wants.
The prior explanations included word that Hunter flunked his physical (a roundhouse rumor in Vancouver) and that he’s trying to negotiate a settlement of a lawsuit filed against him by his former employer, CP rival Canadian National, for violation of his non-compete contract with CN. I call the latter explanation the conventional wisdom.
Now, from one of the most senior-level railroaders in North America, comes a new and not entirely unexpected reason for the wait: Harrison is trying to sign up CN’s chief operations officer, Keith Creel, to come join him at CP. (One source of mine says people at CN are already referring to Creel in the past tense.)
Creel is a Hunter Harrison protégé who came with his boss from the Illinois Central when CN bought IC in 2000. In fact, he still maintains his principal office in the Chicago suburb of Homewood, Ill. Why make the switch? Here’s a chance, after two to five years at Canadian Pacific, for Creel, 44, to succeed Harrison, 68, as CEO. At Canadian National, he’d have to wait as long as 15 years for that chance. CN’s current CEO, Claude Mongeau, is only 50.
Do I believe this? I certainly believe Harrison has faith in Creel’s abilities and loyalty and would like to have Creel at his side again. I guess I assign this rumor a 66 percent probability of being accurate. If you have a more plausible rumor, let’s hear it. — Fred W. Frailey
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