If Tufan Erginbilgic succeeds in his mission, he’ll have worked himself out of a job.
At least that’s how the Rolls-Royce chief executive puts it himself, a year and a half into a business turnaround that has won rapturous praise in the City.
“I came with a purpose,” he tells The Telegraph. “I say to people, I want to be redundant.
“My vision is that you go into a meeting and people tell you the issues and what they are doing about it and you sort of look and say, ‘Wow, OK, thank you. I really appreciate what you’re doing’, but you realise you can’t contribute anymore – because they’ve done everything.
“This has happened to me in previous transformations but not at Rolls-Royce, yet.”
Pulling off a lasting culture change at Rolls, a 118-year-old engine manufacturer known for its bureaucracy, will be far from easy. But it has been at the heart of Mr Erginbilgic’s strategy from the start – and has occasionally required him to administer shock therapy.
Soon after taking charge in January 2023, the Turkish executive – known as “Turbo” by admiring stock market analysts – told the company’s 40,000 employees they were standing on a “burning platform”. Later he described the Germany-based power systems business as “grossly mismanaged” after it allowed profits to slip even as sales rose.
The blunt remarks ruffled feathers at first, with critics accusing him of scoring needless own-goals.
During an interview in The Telegraph’s offices in London, Mr Erginbilgic says the tough comments were necessary to shake the company out of its stupor.
Rolls-Royce had a near-death experience during the coronavirus pandemic under ex-boss Warren East, but too many people were still complacent.
“Some people knew something was wrong and were frustrated and some people, not really,” he says. “So you have to change the mindset, change the culture, change the processes and, in some cases, change the people.
“But I shared my vision of where I think we can go – and that energised people.
“You need a clear strategy if you’re going to mobilise 40,000 employees. And to me, strategy is not about the boardroom.”
Mr Erginbilgic’s early comments have now been reassessed in the wake of his success. He has slashed costs and souped-up profitability.