Albert, who retired as CEO of CRH in December was just appointed (non-executive) chairman of BP plc. It is step up for Albert. CRH was valued at about 65 billion dollars when he retired and BP is at about 85 billion dollars after being over 100 billion in the not so recent past. Albert is not the first Irish person to have that role. Sir Peter Sutherland had it from 1997-2009 and of course Kerryman Bernard Looney was BP CEO until internal scandals ended his career there. To be fair, the Chairman role, at least in major companies like BP and Rio Tinto, is a much more involved role today than it was 20 years ago. BP has it’s challenges, so lets see if Albert can make a difference there.