Pinnacle Airlines has announced that Sean Menke will resign as CEO effective June 1st and I think this got missed in the noise of the AA / US Airways announcements coming on Friday.

Like most announcement of this nature, this is being characterized as Sean Menke having done his job and leaving it in a position for someone to lead forward in a new marketplace.

I think something else happened.  Just weeks ago, Menke’s salary (along with current COO and now soon to be permanent CEO John Spanjers) a very significant amount.  A week later, Pinnacle filed for bankruptcy and now suddenly Menke is leaving in another month or so.

What is going on is pure speculation at this point.  Menke is a valuable leader and I personally felt Pinnacle wasn’t the best fit for a man of his talent.  Pinnacle doesn’t need his marketing acumen.  One wonders if Menke is positioning himself for a new job at a new airline in the near future.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax