New Target CEO Michael Fiddelke is putting candor at the core of his turnaround plan: ‘You can’t solve problems you’re not talking about’

In today’s CEO Daily: Phil Wahba interviews new Target CEO Michael Fiddelke.

The big leadership story: Berkshire Hathaway CEO Greg Abel is putting his salary into company stock.

The markets: Mostly up at the end of a volatile week.

Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune.

Good morning. Earlier this week, I traveled to Target headquarters in Minneapolis to interview newly minted CEO Michael Fiddelke. Target had just reported a straight fourth quarter of comparable sales decline, continuing a slump that has seen it lose market share to many rivals. That same day, Fiddelke laid out for an audience of Wall Street analysts an ambitious plan he said would bring the most change Target has seen in a decade. But Fiddelke, a 23-year company lifer who took the reins five weeks ago, said that plan can’t work unless Target returns to a culture of talking honestly about failures.

“Candor is one of the things culturally that’s really important for us right now, because you can’t solve problems you’re not talking about,” Fiddelke told me. While that might sound squishy, it does echo the approach taken by Macy’s CEO Tony Spring, who told me the same thing in October and has watched the retailer’s long-awaited turnaround take hold.

Fiddelke, 49, is not kidding about........

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