Steven Heyer first came to my attention when he delivered his call for advertainment at Ad Age’s Madison & Vine conference on Feb. 5, 2003.
He’s in the news again. After being passed over for the CEO job at Coca-Cola, he joined Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. as CEO. Now the board has forced him out. According to The Journal News, board members lost confidence in him due to his management style.
“He had a bit of a gruff personality,” said Robert LaFleur, an analyst at Susquehanna Financial Group in Stamford, Conn. “He had a reputation of being somewhat difficult to work with. That was fairly well known. I guess the surprise was that it had gotten so bad that it had become an untenable situation for the board.”
The article also states that Heyer did not get any severance, which is unusual.