• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, June 18, 2012

Just eight months after taking over as president of J. C. Penney, Michael Francis is out. The Plano, Tex.-based retailer, which has been struggling with slumping sales and negative reactions to its extensive repositioning efforts, says its CEO Ron Johnson “will assume direct responsibility and oversight of the company's marketing and merchandising functions.” Until joining Penney last October, Francis had been CMO at Target Corp.