Coach and Couch

When the author was offered the position of non-executive chairman of the board of Siberian Coal and Energy (SUEK) - the largest Russian coal and power generation company (and the eighth largest coal producer in the world), with mining facilities in seven regions from the Russian Far East to Krasnoyarsk, 45,000 employees, and exports to 20 countries - he felt he had plenty of relevant experience to draw on. In the past the author had been a CEO and executive chairman, and had sat on the boards of a number of joint ventures and public companies as the representative of the investors. The task of leading a newly created board with a majority of independent non-executive directors at a privately owned corporation that had the ambition to become a world-class energy company seemed challenging, but manageable.