Lost In Love
Top CEOs who kissed away their jobs
“You can’t buy love, but you can pay heavily for it.” – Henny Youngman
Some CEOs get a little too used to the people around them always saying yes.
Maybe this explains why they sometimes blow it all on love, or lust, or blatant sexual harassment.
Here’s a look at top CEOs who’ve lost their high-paying jobs for office naughtiness.
These are just some of the guys who got caught. And to think they were paid millions for their judgement.
Nestlé CEO Laurent Freixe – September 2025
The world’s largest food company caught it’s CEO Laurent Freixe in “an undisclosed romantic relationship with a subordinate” that violated its code of conduct. Then it gave him the ol’ Nestlé Crunch,.
Freixe had been CEO for only a year, but based on available compensation reports it appeared he lost a gig that paid about $13 million in total annual compensation.
He was hired to turn the tide on Nestlé’s sagging fortunes. At the time he was fired, Nestlé stock was down more than 30% since 2022 thanks to rising cocoa prices and sagging sales.
Freixe joined Nestlé in 1986 and worked his way through the executive ranks. He’s well-educated, speaks four languages, and spit out corporate platitudes like, “We are determined to regain this trust, and to again become the benchmark in our industry.”
But beyond his resume, we know so little about him that his name might as well be “Whatchamacallit.” We don’t even know who his romantic interest is or what this costly relationship entailed. As they say in the candy business, he’s kept it all under wraps.
Read More: The Chocolate Lover
Astronomer CEO Andy Bryon – July 2025
No CEO dalliance has rippled around the globe faster than Byron’s tryst with his human resource executive Kristin Cabot.
The pair simply panicked when they were caught canoodling on the jumbotron at a Coldplay concert. Their reaction prompted Coldplay frontman Chris Martin to speculate: “Either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy.”
They both resigned from the startup, which builds platforms for orchestrating and managing data pipelines, And it had just raised $93 million in venture capital funding.
Read More: Just Smile And Wave
Kohl’s CEO Ashley Buchanan – May 2025
Struggling retailer Kohl’s gave Ashley Buchanan a $20 million compensation package in hopes he could reverse its sagging fortunes. He was fired three months later for reportedly steering millions of dollars in business to his girlfriend.
“Before I took the job was when I assessed the entire business, I just saw opportunity, right?” Buchanan said in a March 2025 conference call.
Opportunity knocked … and it knocked Buchanan right out the door.
Read More: Million-Dollar Baby
Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw – September 2024
Never give your critics ammunition. Alan Shaw made this crucial mistake by having a tryst with the railroad’s Chief Legal Officer Nabanita Nag.
Activist shareholders were gunning for Shaw’s resignation as the railroad’s financial performance slid off off the tracks. Union employees were steamed about him, too. He was especially under pressure after a train derailment decimated East Palestine, Ohio, spilling 100,000 gallons of hazardous materials and costing the company about $1.7 billion.
Shaw kept his job through all of this, but his affair – which was against the corporate ethics policy and rife with conflicts – did him in.
What a train wreck.
Read More: Drivin’ That Train
Comtech CEO Ken Peterman – March 2024
A CEO who has an affair with an underling cheats on his company, his shareholders and often his spouse in a single folly. Ken Peterman may be a case in point.
The company wouldn’t say why it fired him last year, but it all came out after Peterman was arrested on insider trading and securities fraud charges in December 2024.
Before this series of blunders, Peterman was a well-respected aerospace and defense executive.
Comtech’s annual report once touted a line from a cloying profile on him: “Unique and visionary leadership through integrity, passion, and innovation are the qualities that define Ken Peterman.”
Integrity is something you have. Not something to tout in your annual report.
Read More: A CEO’s Road To Hell
Helios Technologies CEO Josef Matosevic – July 2024
Josef Matosevic ran a company that provided electronic controls technology, but he couldn’t control himself.
The company said it replaced him following an investigation into his consensual relationship with an employee.
“The Board does not tolerate any actions that are inconsistent with our Company’s values and code of conduct and upon notification of the allegations, took swift and decisive action,” the board’s chairman said in a press release.
Yeah, but for Helios, this was hardly the first time.
The company fired a previous CEO Wolfgang Dangel in April 2020 for the same thing.
Read More:
Helios Technologies Provides Update on Leadership Transition
Helios Technologies Announces Leadership Transition
BP CEO Bernard Looney – September 2023
Some CEOs treat their companies like a dating app.
BP CEO Bernard Looney resigned following an internal investigation that revealed not one, but multiple dalliances with colleagues. Looney was hired as a drilling engineer in 1991. He became CEO in 2020.
In an earlier investigation, he admitted to having affairs but didn’t disclose them all.
“All leaders in particular are expected to act as role models and to exercise good judgement in a way that earns the trust of others,” the London-base petroleum giant explained in a press release.
All that lovin’ cost him $40 million in severance.
Read More:
CBOE Global Markets CEO Edward Tilly – August 2023
Edward Tilly joined CBOE as a floor trader in 1987 and worked his way through the ranks to become CEO in 2013.
He resigned after the board found he failed to disclose “personal relationships with colleagues.”
There was no telling how many relationships, but the trading company executive must have figured he had options.
Read More: Cboe Global Markets Announces Leadership Transition
NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell – April 2023
Comcast fired the head of NBCUniversal after an internal investigation corroborated allegations of sexual harassment and discrimination.
Jeff Shell had this much to say about it:
“I had an inappropriate relationship with a woman in the company, which I deeply regret. I’m truly sorry I let my Comcast and NBCUniversal colleagues down, they are the most talented people in the business and the opportunity to work with them the last 19 years has been a privilege.”
An “inappropriate relationship?” The company called it “sexual harassment.”
Was the Peacock streaming the wrong content?
Barclay’s CEO Jes Staley – November 2021
Jes Staley stepped down as CEO of Barclays after the British banking giant uncovered his ties to the infamous late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Later, Staley admitted in court that he had consensual sex with one of Epstein’s staffers. But he claimed he had no knowledge of the twisted financier’s “monstrous activities,” trafficking underaged girls to wealthy pedophiles.
In a 2010 email chain, Staley reportedly told Epstein: “That was fun. Say hi to Snow White.” Epstein asked, “What character would you like next?” Staley replied: “Beauty and the Beast.”
It could have been worse. At least he didn’t ask for the “Little Mermaid.”
Read More: Former JPMorgan and Barclays exec Jes Staley tells court he slept with Epstein assistant
McDonald’s CEO Steve Easterbrook – November 2019
Mickey D’s fired its CEO Steve Easterbrook for a consensual relationship with an employee in November 2019. Several months later, an internal investigation uncovered even more inappropriate relationships with employees.
Then in 2023 the Securities and Exchange Commission fined Easterbrook $400,000 for allegedly lying about the terms of his firing in an attempt to keep his massive severance benefits.
Easterbrook ended up losing a $105 million severance package.
They say money can’t buy you love, but that would have been enough to buy more than 20 million Happy Meals.
Read More:
Lululemon Athletica CEO Laurent Potdevin – February 2018
Laurent Potdevin stepped down following years-long romance with one of the company’s female designers.
“Lululemon expects all employees to exemplify the highest levels of integrity and respect for one another, and Mr. Potdevin fell short of these standards of conduct,” the company said in a news release.
Former employees told CNBC that the office romance was just one of the issues that led to Potdevin’s resignation. They complained that overall he instilled a negative and toxic culture.
Read More: Lululemon CEO left in part because of relationship with female designer at the company
Intel CEO Brian Kranzanich – June 2018
Brian Kranzanich stepped down from Intel after the chipmaker learned about his past consensual relationship with an employee.
“An ongoing investigation by internal and external counsel has confirmed a violation of Intel’s non-fraternization policy, which applies to all managers,” the company said.
The affair began a decade earlier and ended before he was named CEO in 2013, but it cost him a fortune once it was finally uncovered.
Kranzanich was making upwards of $21 million a year and enjoyed a generous package of perks, including transportation and personal security.
“That’s the power of Intel inside.”
Read More:
CBS CEO Les Moonves – September 2018
Les Moonves, who ran CBS for 12 years, was one of the most powerful men in media until a dozen women accused him of sexual misconduct in articles in The New Yorker magazine.
CBS’s board announced it fired Moonves“for cause” and would not pay his $120 million severance package. Moonves annual compensation had totaled nearly $70 million in cash and stock over the previous two years two years.
The decision followed an investigation by two law firms that CBS’ board hired – Debevoise & Plimpton and Covington & Burling. And it came about a year after the network firedCharlie Rose, who was co-host of “CBS This Morning”over reports of sexual misconduct.
Could have been a miniseries.
Read More:
Les Moonves and CBS Face Allegations of Sexual Misconduct (The New Yorker)
As Leslie Moonves Negotiates His Exit from CBS, Six Women Raise New Assault and Harassment Claims (The New Yorker)
Kemet Corp. CEO Per-Olof Loof – December 2018
Per-Olof Loof resigned from this Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based company following a consensual relationship with an employee.
“Mr. Loof’s departure follows an investigation … of the facts and circumstances surrounding a consensual personal relationship between Mr. Loof and an employee of the Company and related actions which were inconsistent with the Company’s policies,” the company said in a news release. “Mr. Loof will not receive any severance benefits.”
It was a pricey affair.
Read More: Kemet CEO Resigns Over Alleged Personal Misconduct
Priceline CEO Darren Huston – April 2016
Darren Huston resigned immediately after an internal investigation uncovered a personal relationship he had with an employee who was not even under his direct supervision.
“The investigation determined that Mr. Huston had acted contrary to the Company's Code of Conduct and had engaged in activities inconsistent with the Board's expectations for executive conduct, which Mr. Huston acknowledged and for which he expressed regret,” the company said in a news release.
“Everybody is in favor of finding love, but it’s got to be found in the right place,” Ted Snyder, professor of economics and management at Yale School of Management, told CNBC at the time.
Read More: Priceline CEO quits over personal relationship with employee
Going back further, here’s a list of more CEOs who found themselves lost in love.
American Apparel CEO Dov Charney – June 2014
Best Buy CEO Brian Dunn – April 2012
Highmark CEO Kenneth Melani – April 2012
Stryker CEO Stephen MacMillan – Feb. 2012
Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd – Aug. 2010
Starwood Hotels CEO Steven Heyer – April 2007
Boeing CEO - Harry Stonecipher – March 2005
As Nazareth sang, "Love Hurts".
A take as old as time…