Meg O'Neill
Chief Executive Officer
2026 – Present
0 years (current)
Legacy
Meg O'Neill leads BP as it executes against the priorities reflected in the FY2025 update: BP is trying to simplify its portfolio, reduce net debt, sharpen upstream and trading returns, and rebuild investor confidence after several years of strategy and leadership resets. Her appointment made her BP's first female CEO and the company's first external chief executive in its more than century-long history, a deliberate break from BP's tradition of promoting internal candidates following the disruption of Looney's exit and Auchincloss's brief, turbulent tenure. She joined from Woodside Energy, Australia's largest independent oil and gas producer, where she had led a similar portfolio-simplification and cost-discipline agenda. Analysts have noted her arrival as a signal that BP's board wanted proven operational discipline from outside the company's own management ranks after two consecutive internal CEO successions ended in crisis or underperformance.