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Michael R Bloomberg has decided to reassume the leadership of his business empire only eight months after ending his final term as mayor of New York.
Late Wednesday, Bloomberg told close confidants and senior executives of Bloomberg LP, a financial data and media company, that Daniel L Doctoroff, its chief executive and a longtime friend and lieutenant, would leave the company at the end of the year and that he would take over.
For years, Bloomberg had insisted that he had no intention of returning full time to the company he founded.
When he left politics, Bloomberg, 72, was expected to devote most of his time to giving away his $32.8-billion fortune. Those philanthropic efforts - on issues like gun control, immigration and public health - were supposed to take up much of his time and he would "most likely spend a few hours a day working from his new desk on the fifth floor," at Bloomberg's offices, according to a memo Doctoroff sent employees in January.
But in recent months, Bloomberg - who still owns 88 percent of the company - has become an increasing presence at Bloomberg's Lexington Avenue headquarters. Those "few hours" soon turned into six and seven hours a day with Bloomberg taking a hands-on role in meetings and strategy decisions. Doctoroff, 56, a former deputy mayor of New York and private equity executive, told Bloomberg about two weeks ago that he planned to resign, frustrated with how the leadership dynamic had shifted. Bloomberg urged him to stay and remain chief executive, but Doctoroff demurred.
Doctoroff, who remains a friend of Bloomberg and will join the board of Bloomberg's foundation, explained his decision to step down: "When Mike decided he wanted to spend some time at the company, and then spent more time, obviously things changed." He added, "It isn't the job I had for the past six years. It's his - he wants to be involved. He doesn't want to consult with me on everything. I get that."
"This wasn't the plan," said Bloomberg, sitting next to Doctoroff on Wednesday at a coffee shop on the Upper East Side. "It was his idea. If it was up to me, he would have stayed."
Bloomberg said he fell in love again with the company that he founded in 1981. He said that after vacationing for a couple of weeks in January and working on his philanthropy, he realised that he felt most excited by his work at Bloomberg LP.
| OLD GUARD’S BACK |
Daniel L Doctoroff, CEO of Bloomberg LP, a financial data and media company, would leave the company at the end of the year and Michael Bloomberg, who founded the company in 1981, would take over the leadership of his business empire only 8 months after ending his final term as mayor of New York. Here’s what led to the announcement.
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While Bloomberg said he did not plan to take the title of chief - "I hate titles," he said - he intended to run the company for the foreseeable future. Still, he allowed that it was possible that he could hire a new chief executive if he were to decide to turn his attention elsewhere.
He will take charge of a company that is significantly bigger and more powerful than the one he left more than a decade ago, but it also perhaps faces more challenges. Bloomberg LP is at something of a crossroads, developing new businesses in the hopes of making it more accessible to a broader consumer audience.
Under Doctoroff, who joined Bloomberg LP just six months before the financial crisis flared in September 2008, the company's revenue has jumped to more than $9 billion, from $5.4 billion. Subscriptions to Bloomberg's signature financial-data terminals - which rent for about $20,000 a year - have grown to 321, 000, from 273,000, despite a shrinking financial sector. With many newsrooms dwindling, Bloomberg has added more than 500 reporters and editors during his tenure.
Still, the company's growth has slowed, particularly abroad. And its news division endured criticism last year in the face of accusations that it withheld a report about government corruption in China to protect its business interests there. Separately, it came under fire after acknowledging that its reporters used the company's terminals to extract subscribers' private information.
Whatever fissures existed below the surface between the two men, both insisted that there was no fight over leadership. "The press always wants to write about a battle," Bloomberg said. "There was not a battle."
With a wry smile and a laugh, Doctoroff said: "Mike is kind of like God at the company. He created the universe. He issued the Ten Commandments and then he disappeared. And then he came back. You have to understand that when God comes back, things are going to be different. When God reappeared, people defer."
After a series of tiffs, mostly over not consulting each other on small decisions and conversations, Bloomberg went to Doctoroff and said, "The only answer is for me not to be here." Doctoroff said he replied, "Mike, that's not the answer that I want or that you want. This is your company. You ought to get out of it what you want."
Ultimately, Bloomberg agreed with that assessment. "If he asked me as a personal friend, he should leave because he wants to be the CEO of a company and with my name on the door, the best he could do is be co-CEO," he said.
While Doctoroff made strides to reimagine some of Bloomberg LP's closed culture, he was stymied by some of the company's byzantine political fiefs.
©2014 The New York Times News Service
