By naming 53-year-old Janet Truncale as its next global chief executive, EY will hope it can put behind it a nasty bushfire ignited by one rival candidate over the final leadership taboo: old age.
During his campaign for the top job, Andy Baldwin, 57, warned executives discussing his candidacy that they risked breaching age discrimination laws if they made too much of the fact that a four-year term heading the professional services firm would push him beyond 60. That is when EY usually requires its partners to step down.
Sixty seems an absurdly and arbitrarily early age at which to ask executives to hand in their lanyards and badges. Except in the case of a few physically demanding jobs, mandatory retirement also seems an anachronistic throwback. Most countries are obliging workers to toil for longer before they can claim a state pension. Companies are also falling over themselves to become more inclusive.