Clockwise from top: Former Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun (CNBC), Starbucks former CEO Laxman Narasimhan (Getty Images), former Nike CEO John Donahoe (Reuters), former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger (Getty Images)TL: CNBC | TR: Getty Images | BL: Reuters | BR: Getty ImagesRetired, ousted or poached, CEOs headed for the exits this year.U.S. public companies announced 327 chief executive changes this year through November, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.That’s more than in any other year since at least 2010, when the firm first started tracking the turnover. It’s also an 8.6% increase from last year.Turnover included CEOs at U.S. companies that have long dominated their industries — like Boeing, Nike and Starbucks. The pace of change points to those companies’ customers, investors, hedge funds or boards growing impatient with sales slumps or strategic missteps in an otherwise strong economy when consumers proved they were willing to spend.CEO changes slowed during the pandemic, when companies were suddenly faced with lockdowns, remote work, supply chain difficulties and shortages, if not outright survival. They later faced higher borrowing costs, inflation, labor shortages, shifting consumer preferences and other challenges.Over the past 14 years, 2021 had the lowest number of replacements at 197.”The cost of capital, the speed of transformation, is creating faster turnover,” said Clarke Murphy, managing director and former chief executive of Russell Reynolds Associates, a leadership advisory firm.[embedded content]Murphy said it was easier to stand out for poor performance in an otherwise strong market.”In years of 20-plus-percent S&P [500] returns two years in a row, any company that’s significantly underperforming, the spotlight has been on, and boards of directors moved faster than they might have moved five or seven years ago,” Murphy said.Consumer-focused companies, which are more susceptible to changing tastes and trends, generally have higher turnover than industries like oil and gas or utilities, which tend to have internal and longer-tenured CEOs.The recent spike in turnover comes even as the number of public companies has dropped.Here are some of the major U.S. CEO changes so far this year:IntelThe semiconductor company ousted CEO Pat Gelsinger earlier this month, nearly four years after he was appointed to turn the chipmaker around and better compete with rivals.Intel’s stock price and market share had collapsed as the artificial intelligence wave boosted chipmaker Nvidia while Intel struggled to crack into the business.A successor hasn’t yet been named.BoeingThe aerospace giant announced former CEO Dave Calhoun’s departure in March, part of a broad executive shake-up. It came nearly three months after an unsecured door plug blew off midair from a nearly new Boeing 737 Max 9 operated by Alaska Airlines, plunging the company back into a safety crisis after years of problems across its defense and commercial aerospace business, frustrating the leaders of some of its biggest airline customers.Calhoun himself was appointed in the last days of 2019 to succeed ex-CEO Dennis Muilenburg, who was ousted for his handling of the aftermath of two fatal crashes of Boeing’s 737 Max in 2018 and 2019.Boeing’s new CEO Kelly Ortberg visits the company’s 767 and 777/777X programs’ plant in Everett, Washington, U.S. August 16, 2024. Boeing | Marian Lockhart | Via ReutersCalhoun was succeeded in August by Kelly Ortberg, a three-decade aerospace veteran and former Rockwell Collins CEO, whom Boeing plucked out of retirement in Florida to steady the company.In the midst of a labor strike, which ended last month, Ortberg announced thousands of layoffs and slashed costs elsewhere to conserve cash as Boeing works toward stabilizing production.StarbucksWith sales shrinking in its biggest markets, Starbucks poached Chipotle Mexican Grill star CEO Brian Niccol to turn around the coffee chain’s fortunes, replacing Laxman Narasimhan. The company’s shares soared nearly 25% when Niccol’s appointment was announced in August.Brian Niccols, CEO of Starbucks, speaking with CNBC on Oct. 31st, 2024. CNBCIn the 100 days since his appoi …
