Former PTSB chief executive Jeremy Masding admits in a book he recently co-wrote on how to manage a company, Leading Without Winging It, that he’s had to, on occasion, do just that.
Readers looking for nuggets on the mess encountered at PTSB in 2012 and how Masding went about saving the bank will be left disappointed in this fairly prescriptive leadership manual – offered as an alternative to the CEO autobiographies and academic tomes that crowd business section bookshelves. Readers might have been better served, however, with firm examples from experience. At PTSB, Masding had to lead the development of mortgage arrears systems from scratch, convince the government and the European Commission the bank was even worth saving, and, against the odds, complete the sale of its UK loan book in 2016 after the Brexit vote, while offloading billions more of problem mortgages.