Meg O’Neill’s rapid rise to the top of one of the world’s biggest fossil-fuel companies has been unencumbered by doubt. At a moment when oil executives are still being pressed to move away from hydrocarbons, she has a different argument: that the world is nowhere near done with them.
So when BP Plc stunned markets by naming an external chief executive officer for the first time, the choice of O’Neill signaled more than a leadership change. It marked a recalibration for BP, bruised by a failed pivot toward renewable energy, years of uneven financial performance, and pressure from activist ...
