MEC said Global CEO Charles Courtier will take management responsibility for the North American operations until a new CEO is named, and said a team of other executives would help during the transition, including GroupM North America CEO Rob Norman, and five senior MEC managers:
* Marla Kaplowitz,
President, US Clients
* Eamonn Store, President, Global Solutions
* Dennis Donlin, President, Team AT&T
* Mark Sanders, Chief Financial Officer
* Michele Pauchuk, President MEC
Canada "MEC is good at change," Doyle said in a statement, adding, "It's what we do best and this is an opportunity for the agency to take a new direction. I can't wait to see what's round the next
corner."
Courtier emphasized that "it's not goodbye," noting, "Lee is committed to the group and vice versa - we will see him in a new role soon."
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Before joining MEC in 2000, Doyle was executive vice president-director of media services at Ammirati & Puris Lintas, which was subsequently merged into Interpublic's Lowe unit. Before that, he cut his teeth in the legendary media department of Benton & Bowles, and ultimately into its media services spin-off MediaVest, which he became a senior vice president-group media director working on a range of accounts including Procter & Gamble, Kraft, Masterfoods, Whirlpool and Philips Electronics, and where he forged a close bond with former MediaVest chief Irwin Gotlieb, now global CEO of WPP's GroupM, the largest media services company in the world.