Michael Soden: career profile: Michael Soden's arrival at Baggot Street in 2002 was a surprise. A native of Dublin, Mr Soden, worked abroad for most of his career and was a senior executive at National Australia Bank, before he joined Bank of Ireland.

He had formerly held a number of senior positions at National Australia Bank, including running the group's global retail activities and was hired to provide a fresh approach at Bank of Ireland.

He was a controversial chief executive. Soon after talking the job, he floated the idea of merging Bank of Ireland with AIB. It gained little support and the Tánaiste, Ms Harney, quickly came out against it on competition grounds.

Observers were surprised that he had aired it publicly , particularly as it did not seem to have the support of the bank's directors.

Mr Soden also led an abortive attempt to take over the former UK building society, Abbey National. Before Mr Soden arrived, Bank of Ireland had failed in a bid to merge with Alliance & Leicester.

The move on Abbey National was seen as a key a strategic initiative. However, it met with a hostile reaction from Abbey National and the markets quickly turned against the idea, feeling that Bank of Ireland had not prepared the ground properly. The failure of the bid led to intense questioning of the bank's strategy for growing its profits outside of its home market

An affable figure, Mr Soden tried to pioneer a new culture at Bank of Ireland and said recently in an interview with The Irish Times that this was be the key part of his legacy in the job.

He insisted that the top floor of the bank's headquarters in Baggot Street was completely refurbished. Old wood-panelled offices in which senior executive used to work were taken down and replaced by an open plan structure. He also brought in a number of executives from outside the organisation to head key functions such as human resources and IT.

Having failed to take over Abbey National, the Bank of Ireland last year announced a deal with the British Post Office to distribute some of the bank's financial products through its networks. Mr Soden argued that this initiative offered huge potential for the bank in the years ahead.

However, investors remain cautious, as the likely scale of the business through this new channel remains unclear and the bank's share price has remained relatively weak,

In his earlier career, Mr Soden was chief executive officer, Security Pacific Hoare Govett Ltd in London, with responsibility for international capital markets and held a number of senior positions with Citicorp. He was educated at University College Dublin and Blackrock College.