Another veteran exec leaving

Quite suddenly, the faces at the top of the telecom industry have dramatically changed. A year ago, four long-time Bell executives — Ed Whitacre at AT&T, Duane Ackerman at BellSouth, Richard Notebaert at Qwest and Ivan Seidenberg at Verizon — were at the helm of the largest incumbent U.S. providers.

Very shortly, only Seidenberg will remain. Ackerman retired with the merger of AT&T and BellSouth. Whitacre surprised many with his abrupt departure from AT&T, a year or so earlier than most people expected him to leave. And now Notebaert, perhaps the most surprising of all, has joined them with his decision to leave Qwest as soon as a successor can be found.

His announcement came within weeks of the retirement of two of his top lieutenants. They worked with Notebaert at Ameritech, when he was chairman and CEO there from 1994 until it was purchased by SBC Communications, and came with him to Qwest in 2002 to help right that troubled company.

Oren Shaffer resigned as vice chairman and chief financial officer effective April 1 and was replaced by John W. Richardson, who had been controller and a senior vice president of finance. Barry K. Allen steps down as executive vice president of operations as of June 29 and will be replaced by Robert Tregemba, a vice president of network operations and engineering.

Notebaert leaves having done yeoman's work in turning Qwest around from being on the brink of bankruptcy and under U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission scrutiny to posting an operating profit in 2006. He imposed tight discipline on spending at the company but also focused on improving performance in key areas such as customer service. The company achieved significant milestones, winning the right to compete with AT&T and Verizon Business for the U.S. General Services Administration's $48 million Networx Universal contract. But Qwest still faces major challenges, including what its video and service bundling strategies will be going forward.

WHITACRE VERSUS NOTEBAERT: TALE OF THE TAPE