Czech industry leaders this month chose CEZ's Daniel Benes as their ‘Manager of the Year'. And why not? Think of all that value he has added over the last ten years...to CEZ's suppliers!


Industry leaders admire Dan's ample bottom line, smaller than last year but still big enough to satisfy local appetites.

I have been out of the Czech Republic for the last three months and have lost touch with Czech reality. So when I heard that Daniel Benes had been chosen by his industry peers as ‘Manager of the Year 2014’, I thought it must be some mistake. After all, CEZ’s 2014 profits plummeted and continue to do so, and the firm’s foreign adventures lie in ruins.

In the year that Daniel B is supposed to have done such a good job according the Confederation of Czech Industry, CEZ’s foreign operations lost over Kc 5bn (that is 12% of CEZ’s 2014 dividend). And the Czech criminal police spent so much time on the management floor of CEZ’s Prague headquarters in 2014 looking for evidence of suspected mismanagement and fraud that one could be forgiven for asking if it isn't those detective inspectors who deserve the accolade in place of Benes: after all, it is they who have been more or less managing his company for the last twelve months.

But then my sense of Czech reality returned. Of course Benes deserves this public pat on the back from his peers. For there is no doubt that he has added enormous value, albeit not to CEZ, but at least to the personal fortunes of the heads of those companies living off CEZ contracts, those very same captains of industry who chose to celebrate his achievements this month.

You could hardly expect them to point out that their emperor is naked.