T-Mobile COO Mike Sievert replaces John Legere as CEO in May 2020

Posted:
in General Discussion edited November 2019
John Legere will be exiting his role as CEO of T-Mobile in April 2020, to be replaced by President and COO Mike Sievert on May 1, but despite stepping down from the top of one of the four main U.S. Carriers, Legere seemingly won't be taking early retirement.

John Legere (left), Mike Sievert (right)
John Legere (left), Mike Sievert (right)


A surprise announcement via press release, T-Mobile's board of directors has named Mike Sievert as the next chief executive officer of the carrier, starting from May 1, 2020, with the full title of President and CEO. Sievert will take the role from current CEO John Legere, who will continue until his contract concludes at the end of April.

The early announcement is part of a "well-established succession planning process" by the board, and Legere will continue to be a member of the T-Mobile board itself after ending his CEO role.

"John Legere has had an enormously successful run as CE," said Deutsche Telekom CEO and T-Mobile US board chairman Tim Hottges. "As the architect of the Un-carrier strategy and the company's complete transformation, John has put T-Mobile US in an incredibly strong position. I have the highest respect for his performance as a manager, and as a friend, I am very grateful to him for the time together."

Legere is known for having a particularly brash and bombastic style in talking at events and presentations, which has led to him being one of the more prominent CEOs around. His popularity has translated into a considerable following on social media, where he has over 6.5 million followers.

Legere claims his focus for the coming months will be "on ensuring a smooth leadership transition and continuing to work closely with the Board and Mike to complete the Sprint transaction," a $26.5 billion merger that has received regulatory approvals but is waiting on the conclusion of a bipartisan lawsuit from 13 state attorneys general and the District of Columbia before the deal completes. "This merger will create the New T-Mobile - a company that is uniquely positioned to continue disrupting the wireless category - and beyond. This marks the beginning of a dynamic new chapter for T-Mobile"

On his intended movement forward, Sievert advises "The Un-carrier culture, which all our employees live every day, will not change," with his mission being to continue building on T-Mobile's "reputation for empowering employees to deliver an outstanding customer experience and to position T-Mobile not only as the leading mobile carrier, but as one of the most admired companies in America."

Despite the upcoming end of his work as CEO of T-Mobile, there is little known about what Legere will do in the future. There has been some speculation suggesting he would become the CEO of the embattled WeWork, but sources of CNBC claim he isn't in the running for the job.

Legere himself advised in a call he is "not retiring," and has received interest from other organizations seeking his leadership. The terms of his contract with T-Mobile prevents him from working with competitors like Verizon and AT&T, but that would have been unlikely anyway given his previous comments about rival carriers.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 14
    Note sure that Un-Carrier can continue without him.
    libertyforallcornchip
  • Reply 2 of 14
    So the recent WeWork leak may be proven true after all. 
    rinosaur
  • Reply 3 of 14
    Intriguing character: love him or hate him, but one has to admire his blunt, no-bullshit honesty, and the fact that he was able to take T-Mobile to the next level, as well as shepherd the merger with Sprint.

    I have little doubt that he'll be picked up by some other company -- I doubt that it'll be WeWork -- at twice the salary.
    libertyforallcornchip
  • Reply 4 of 14
    emig647emig647 Posts: 2,455member
    His talents would be wasted on a trash ponzi scheme company like WeWork. He was definitely at the center of pulling T-Mobile out from a funk. Hope their trend continues so someone can fight off Verizon and ATT. 

    I’m intrigued in what his next move will be. 
    retrogusto
  • Reply 5 of 14
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,038member
    He did so much for the US cellular customers. Even if you don't use T-Mobile, if you had a cell phone plan in the US you benefited from what he did.
    retrogustoZepLepplincornchip
  • Reply 6 of 14
    He can also hustle a side gig as a Ben Franklin impersonator for corporate events.
    edited November 2019
  • Reply 7 of 14
    It seems like the merger with Sprint could make T-Mobile stronger and more competitive or complacent and less competitive. I’ve been confident that we would see the former, due to Legere’s track record, but now I’m less sure. I really hope his successor has what it takes to maintain  their competitive momentum. 
    edited November 2019 cornchip
  • Reply 8 of 14
    Most consumers probably think Legere is an actor who plays the CEO on TV and the Internet.  

    Maybe Legere leaving his job to run for President...  At this point, I would be surprised if he won.
  • Reply 9 of 14
    yuck9yuck9 Posts: 112member
    Where I live both services suck.  Closed stores are showing up in more places all the time.

    Know someone that went to work for  TMobile left after 2 months.  Worked 10 hour days, 6 days a week. Problem: He said all the data they can use won't help if its so slow, bad signal,etc. I tried it and never got anything better then 2-4gb down. 
  • Reply 10 of 14
    yuck9 said:
    Where I live both services suck.  Closed stores are showing up in more places all the time.

    Know someone that went to work for  TMobile left after 2 months.  Worked 10 hour days, 6 days a week. Problem: He said all the data they can use won't help if its so slow, bad signal,etc. I tried it and never got anything better then 2-4gb down. 
    I’ve  had a similar experience.  They’re suffering from severe network congestion as a result of the merger.  It has cleared up a bit this last week, but that could be weather related (affecting where people conjugate). 

    FYI: I think you mean 2-4Mbps

    My performance is all over the place since the merger was announced, but never reaching pre merger levels of 75Mbps.  If the connection was stable at a lesser speed (12Mbps for example) it would be fine.  Unfortunately, it cuts out completely....which doesn’t matter for streaming video (because of buffering) but for anything that requires a persistent connection (gaming etc.) it’s unusable.
  • Reply 11 of 14
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,600member
    Well, I never really liked his methods. T-Mobile has been fined a number of times for lying. Most of that can be directly laid at his feet. They do not have the best reputation for delivering what they say.

    nevertheless, his up front, Elon Musk like exposition, including profanity, has certainly upped the public awareness of the company.

    the problem with this deal, and it’s been noted in the industry publications, is that they have completely different networks, and it going to cost a lot of money and time to reconcile that. It could be a reason he left now that the deal is nearing fruition.
    edited November 2019 libertyforallcornchip
  • Reply 12 of 14
    Bad move, he was right for T-Mobile, kind of like the Steve Jobs of mobile in some ways.  
    tundraboy
  • Reply 13 of 14
    Maybe the merger resulting in a payout for him that meant he could cruise the rest of his life!
  • Reply 14 of 14
    tundraboytundraboy Posts: 1,908member
    T-Mobile is one of the best run companies in the world.  Highly innovative, competitive pricing structure, and customer service, in particular, is stellar. Plus all the customer reps I've spoken to are either very good actors or truly happy to be working there.  I hope they continue on the same path under the new guy; would not want to switch to the competitors.

    A lot of great things can be accomplished if you're not too greedy and focus on the long term.
    edited November 2019
Sign In or Register to comment.