The Worley Ltd (ASX: WOR) share price is the worst performer on the S&P/ASX 200 index on Monday.
In afternoon trade the engineering company's shares are down a sizeable 8.5% to $13.95.
At one stage today the Worley share price was down as much as 10% to $13.71.
Why is the Worley share price crashing lower on Monday?
Investors have been selling the company's shares due to weakness in the energy sector and the announcement of the retirement of its chief executive officer and managing director, Andrew Wood.
Mr Wood has been with the company for 26 years and has spent the last 7 years as its leader.
Worley has acted swiftly to replace the outgoing chief executive officer. It has announced the appointment of Chris Ashton to the top job, effective February 24.
Mr Ashton has been at Worley since 1998 and has held many leadership roles in the company. He was most recently Worley's chief operating officer and responsible for the integration of the ECR business. He was also responsible for the strategy of the transformed Worley business.
Prior to this, he was accountable for the growth and performance of the Major Projects and Integrated Solutions portfolio. This includes the fabrication businesses, WorleyCord and Rosenberg Worley, and its Global Delivery Center.
Worley's chairman, John Grill, said "Andrew Wood has had a distinguished career with Worley spanning 26 years, with the last seven as our CEO. Andrew's contribution has been fundamental to creating the global company we are today. Under Andrew's strong leadership, we successfully restructured Worley to realign our operations through a period of rapid change in the markets we serve, and then doubled the size of the business through the acquisition of the Energy, Chemicals and Resources (ECR) division of Jacobs to create the global leader across Worley's core market segments."
Mr Grill spoke positively about the appointment of Chris Ashton.
He said: "The Board is looking forward to working with Chris as we enter a very dynamic period for Worley. After a thorough internal and external search process undertaken as part of our standard succession planning processes, Chris was identified as the successor for the CEO role. This is the right time for new leadership and the Board has confidence in Chris' experience, commitment and focus.
The company's new chief executive officer appears up for the challenge.
Mr Ashton said: "It is a great privilege to assume the leadership of this great company. The next decade will see unprecedented change in the energy, chemicals and resources industries which we serve. Our customers are being driven by having to address two fundamental structural disruptions; the Energy Transition and changes resulting from the adoption of digital processes."
"After more than 20 years with Worley, I know the company, its customers and stakeholders well. I am looking forward to visiting offices, fabrication yards, customers, job sites and investors in the very near future," he added.
