Fredrik Carlsson

On the 7th of February 2019, in Enköping, Sweden, a small industrial town west of Stockholm, at 8.30 in the morning, a company most American operators have never heard of publishes a two-sentence announcement.

The board has terminated the chief executive, and the stated reason is that the board and the CEO could not agree on his future pay.

And keep in mind, this was not any CEO.

Fredrik Carlsson had run the company since 1998.

And in 2018, his last full year, it earned 2.2 billion Swedish kronor of EBITDA on 12 billion kronor of sales across 146 operating companies.

Now, put yourself in a shareholder's seat that day.

The person most associated with building the machine, who picked the niches, trained the people, and set the price discipline is gone.

The next morning, the board named the deputy CEO Per Valdemarsson as the president and chief executive.