BP is struggling with basic governance

BP is struggling with basic governance: that’s the only conclusion we can draw from the fact that the company has found itself in yet another major boardroom ordeal. 

This time, chair Albert Manifold has been ousted after only seven months in the job. It was, by no means, an amicable departure. Manifold has already pledged to fight his dismissal, as well as the allegations that led to it. 

It should be a time of unrivalled success for the global oil and gas giant, with prices and profits spiking in the wake of the Iran war. But the fact is that, over the past few years, BP has struggled to find the right leaders to execute its long-term strategic plan. Even more worrying is the fact that the plan itself has flip-flopped massively over the same period. 

In short, BP can’t figure out its future, and even if it can, its leadership hasn’t proved anywhere near solid enough. These are basic governance struggles. When they happen in a company as big as BP, it’s a nightmare.

• The board has ousted Albert Manifold. The announcement in late May 2026 was viewed as extremely sudden. 
• Insiders reported that his dismissal was due to “bullying” and “overbearing” leadership, backed by several whistleblower complaints. They suggested Manifold was overly controlling, talked down to senior colleagues, and tried to run the company’s day-to-day operations as chair. 
• Manifold has blasted the decision and disputed the claims. He maintains he did not know about the multiple whistleblower complaints and was unable to respond before his dismissal. He told Bloomberg News, “I dispute entirely the characterisation of my conduct and I will not allow a false narrative to go unchallenged.”
• Manifold had only held the role of chair since October 2025.

The first and most obvious is that Manifold’s exit comes mere months after his appointment as chair. In that short time, he suffered from pushback around his re-election in April and now multiple alleged whistleblower complaints. In isolation, this is embarrassing; in the context of BP, it’s just one of multiple leadership challenges. 

Manifold himself replaced long-time chair Helge Lund, who was ousted in 2025 over concerns around the company’s green transition. Polarised activists had long debated the merits of such a transition, and Lund eventually ended up with little support in settling that debate. 

Meanwhile, former CEO Bernard Looney was fired in 2023 over allegations of failing to disclose past personal relationships with colleagues. He was replaced by Murray Auchincloss, who attempted to undo some of Looney’s green transition work and steer the company’s long-term strategy back to oil and gas. However, again, activists turned against him, and he resigned under pressure in December 2025. 

Each one of the above departures has some things in common. All were sudden. All were fuelled by some form of conflict, and all underscored major disagreements over the company’s internal process and long-term goals. 

These issues are red flags that scream “bad governance”. They expose a severe lack of planning and clarity, not to mention multiple concerns about BP’s ability to vet personal conduct. 

BP is in a rough patch, identity-wise. In this decade of highly polarised politics, should it pursue sustainability in the long term, or ignore that and go for short-term profits? 

In the early 2020s, the company was leaning towards sustainability. Now, it’s trending the opposite way. But through it all, it has not been able to send a clear message on the issue, especially not with influential entities like Elliott Management, Glass Lewis and Legal and General scrutinising its every move. 

The latter two were critical of BP’s shift away from a green transition and urged investors to vote against Manifold’s re-election in April. The former was instrumental in Auchincloss’ departure.

Will the whistleblower complaints against Manifold be substantiated in time? We don’t know that yet. But what we do know suggests that the company’s internal processes for dealing with such complaints might have some significant flaws. 

Manifold claims not to have been informed of the whistleblower, at least in any official capacity, which would suggest a weak link from a due process perspective. It also raises questions of whether leaders attempted any internal resolution around working relationships before dismissal proceedings. 

On the flipside, such a sudden dismissal may indicate that standards are at least high. The rest of BP’s board clearly believes those standards have been breached and took swift action to address it. We’ll just need to wait and see if the decision came too quickly or was key in avoiding potential reputational risk.

The Financial Times said this latest saga reinforced the idea that BP is “ungovernable”. Based on the number of basic blunders, that statement may well be true. 

It’s not the easiest time to be an oil/gas giant, but in many ways, the problem for BP isn’t its industry; it’s the way it manages communications with stakeholders. Unfortunately, those communications won’t improve until the company gets its strategic direction locked in, alongside an ability to pick leaders that can go the long term without generating fresh crises.