Keane CEO: Rapid Exit, Steady Income
By now, you likely know that Keane Inc. President and CEO Brian Keane has abruptly resigned amid allegations of personal misconduct at the IT consulting firm.
Mr. Keane denies any wrongdoing. A Keane press release states that the CEO’s resignation was a mutual decision with the board. But if you read the company’s latest SEC filing, you’ll learn the board requested Mr. Keane’s resignation, and he complied.
Despite Mr. Keane’s fall from grace, he won’t go hungry. The SEC filing says the company will pay Mr. Keane a $26,000 monthly consulting fee through December 31, 2007. That’s $312,000 annually, down from Mr. Keane’s previous annual compensation of $834,000, according to Yahoo Finance.
What, if anything, did Mr. Keane allegedly do wrong? The company won’t say, but a May 10 press release disclosing Mr. Keane’s resignation included the following statement: “The situation we are addressing does not involve the Company’s operational performance, finances, reported results of operations or internal controls.”
That’s reassuring to Wall Street. We’ll have to wait to see if Mr. Keane’s resignation impacts the company’s relationships with customers. The Keane family, after all, founded the company in 1965.