Tribune CEO Randy Michaels resigns

story by Los Angeles Times
written by Michael Oneal and Phil Rosenthal

Chicago — Randy Michaels has resigned as chief executive of Tribune Co. in the wake of complaints about behavior deemed improper by the board of directors.

He will be replaced by a four-member executive council, which will be charged with stabilizing the company while it struggles to exit bankruptcy protection after almost two years of stop-and-start negotiations with creditors.

The four members of the leadership team announced Friday are Eddy Hartenstein, CEO and publisher of Los Angeles Times Media Group; Tony Hunter, president, publisher and CEO of Chicago Tribune Co.; Nils Larsen, Tribune Co. chief investment officer; and Don Liebentritt, who is in charge of the company's Chapter 11 restructuring.

Tribune owns the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, KTLA-TV Channel 5 and other media properties.

Hartenstein, 59, arrived at the Los Angeles Times in August 2008 after a lengthy career at Hughes Electronics Corp., the defense contractor and satellite maker later acquired by General Motors Corp. At Hughes, he pushed the idea of using satellite technology to beam television programming directly into the homes of consumers.

He persuaded his bosses at GM to finance what eventually would become DirecTV Group Inc. He was with DirecTV, first as its president and then CEO, from its inception in 1994 until 2004, after GM sold its stake in the company to Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.

Hartenstein is on the boards of Broadcom Corp., SanDisk Corp., Sirius XM Radio Inc. and the City of Hope hospital in Duarte.

Michaels' departure followed weeks of escalating allegations that he and a cadre of former colleagues and associates from the radio industry had tarnished the media company's public image and internal culture alike with boorish, sexist behavior and a general atmosphere of juvenile unprofessionalism.

Michaels has also left the Tribune board.

Since he was installed in 2007 by Tribune Chairman Sam Zell, Michaels has maintained that his raucous, unconventional style was intended to foster creativity at a company desperate for new ideas.

Tribune's creditors have commended Michaels and his team for stabilizing the finances of the company amid a devastating recession and seismic shifts in the media business.

But in the end, sources say, the former on-air radio personality was undone by a growing perception among once-supportive Tribune board members that his tactics were more irresponsible than effective.

There were complaints about pranks and loud parties at Tribune headquarters. Some women said they were the targets of sexually suggestive comments and behavior.

The new council will run the company until Tribune and its creditors can agree on a restructuring plan that will allow the company to emerge from Chapter 11 protection. At that point, the group of banks and hedge funds that own Tribune's senior debt will take over the company and pick a new board of directors.

The executive council will also have to deal with a deep well of resentment that has built up at Tribune Co. over the three years Zell and Michaels have been in control. Anger over the $57.3 million in bonuses that have been approved by the court since the company filed for Chapter 11 in 2008, for instance, is palpable among employees who haven't had an annual salary increase in several years.