Amid Sam Altman's ouster, a look at 5 CEOs fired from their own company

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, was sacked on Saturday.

Sam Altman, the chief executive officer (CEO) of OpenAI was fired by the company’s board on Saturday after the organisation claimed that it “lost confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI”. The news created a widespread buzz and now Altman is set to join Microsoft. Moreover, OpenAI has hired Twitch co-founder Emmett Shear as the interim CEO.

However, Altman is not alone in this league. A post by the World of Statistics on X listed several founders who were fired from their own businesses, including, Steve Jobs, Andrew Mason and Jack Dorsey, among others.

Founders who were fired from their own businesses:

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— World of Statistics (@stats_feed) November 18, 2023

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs, one of the co-founders of tech mammoth Apple, was fired from the company in 1985, following a clash with the board of directors. The reason behind his ouster was his confrontational management and poor interpersonal skills.

However, he rejoined Apple in 1997 and helped the company in achieving greater heights. He served as the CEO for 14 years before passing the role to Tim Cook.

Ankiti Bose

Co-founder and CEO of Zilingo Ankiti Bose was ousted from the company in 2022. The Singapore-based fashion tech firm sacked Bose over alleged financial discrepancies. She allegedly gave herself a 10X salary hike without the company board’s approval.

Her salary, according to a report by Inc42, grew from SGD 5,500 in 2017 to SGD 58,900 (more than 10 times) in 2019.

Jack Dorsey

One of the co-founders of Twitter, Jack Dorsey was sacked from his position of CEO in 2008. The company’s board found him unfit to lead. His inability to solve a persistent outage issue causing routine crashes, his habit of leaving work early to pursue other interests like yoga and fashion and the absence of a backup system for the entire Twitter network were some of the reasons behind his ouster.

However, he was reinstated in 2015 and was CEO for six years before resigning in 2021. He was succeeded by Parag Agrawal.

Justin Zhu

Justin Zhu, co-founder and CEO of Iterable Inc., was fired for violating company policy in 2021. According to Zhu, the board’s chief reason for ousting him was that he took LSD, an illegal drug in the U.S., before a meeting in 2019. Zhu told Bloomberg that he was experimenting with a limited amount of the drug, or microdosing, in an effort to boost his focus.

Zhu was replaced by co-founder Andrew Boni, who said Zhu’s dismissal was over unspecified violations of “Iterable’s Employee Handbook, policies and values.”

Andrew Mason

Groupon Inc fired Andrew Mason as chief executive in 2013 after he failed to reverse a crumbling share price or stop a gradual erosion of its main daily deals business, according to Reuters.

In a letter to the company, Mason confessed that he was getting in the way of the company he co-founded just a few years ago and had failed in his role as a leader. "After four and a half intense and wonderful years as CEO of Groupon, I've decided that I'd like to spend more time with my family. Just kidding - I was fired today. If you're wondering why... you haven't been paying attention.”

"From controversial metrics in our S1 to our material weakness to two quarters of missing our own expectations and a stock price that's hovering around one quarter of our listing price, the events of the last year and a half speak for themselves. As CEO, I am accountable,” he wrote.