Adam Crozier, Royal Mail's chief executive, could be forgiven if he were a little apprehensive about the Government's appointment of Donald Brydon as chairman of the state-run postal service.

Mr Brydon, who becomes a non-executive director of Royal Mail immediately and is to take over the chairmanship from Allan Leighton at the end of March, has a history of disposing of chief executives.

In a recent interview, Mr Brydon, 63, pointed to three examples: the chief executive of Allied “got chopped”; the chief executive of ScottishPower “got chopped”; and he “changed” the chief executive at Smiths, the engineering company, of which he remains chairman.

However, it is unlikely that the Scot will wield the axe at Royal Mail. The tenure of Mr Crozier and Mr Leighton, who stands down as chairman after seven years, has seen Royal Mail transformed from an organisation that was losing £1 million a day to one able to report profits of £255 million in the nine months to Christmas.

However, there is plenty to keep Mr Brydon busy. The company is struggling with competition from e-mail and the internet, as well as from rival mail operators.

Mr Brydon, whose base salary will be £200,000 a year, is expected to oversee a sale of a minority stake in Royal Mail.

Mr Brydon, who is a father of two, graduated in 1967 with a degree in mathematical science, and spent two years as a tutor and research associate in the University of Edinburgh's economics department. He decided to go into fund management with the British Airways pension fund.

His conservative investment strategy stood him in good stead, both with BA and later with Barclays, and he rose to head the bank's fund management arm. He refused to succumb to stock market hype in the build-up to the secondary banking crisis of 1973.

Mr Brydon recalls an encounter with Robert Maxwell at a Takeover Panel meeting to consider Maxwell's stake in Reuters, the media group now Thomson Reuters. “I've never seen anybody come into a room where every single pair of eyes followed him all the way round,” he said. “He had extraordinary charisma.”

The meeting ended abruptly when Maxwell was caught trying to record it. “He left screaming, 'I will see all of your careers ruined!'.”

Mr Brydon, who is the London Metal Exchange chairman, collects postcards - aptly enough for Royal Mail's head - and books on Stanley, the explorer.