Automattic's 33-Hour CEO Ouster and Reinstatement Raises Questions About Governance

A dramatic shift in leadership unfolded at Automattic this month, the company behind WordPress and several other digital properties. On Thursday, the organization announced that CEO Matt Mullenweg would be taking leave, with CFO Mark Davies stepping in temporarily. Within 33 hours and 20 minutes, however, Mullenweg was back in the role.

Mullenweg founded WordPress in 2003 and established Automattic two years later. The company operates a portfolio that includes the microblogging platform Tumblr, the e-commerce plugin WooCommerce, and the messaging application Beeper, alongside WordPress itself.

Automattic has offered no public accounting of the circumstances surrounding either the departure or the rapid return. The company's director of communications, Megan Fox, stated only that "Matt Mullenweg is the chairman and CEO of Automattic, with full support of the board." Mullenweg himself posted to Slack that "the board is back in agreement, and I'm in control of Automattic," adding that "a lot happened in the past 48 hours that we need to sort out."

Interpreting a boardroom reversal

The swift reinstatement has prompted speculation about whether the board attempted to remove Mullenweg and failed. Roman Milyushkevich, CEO and CTO at HasData, cautioned against jumping to conclusions. "It certainly looks like a failed attempt to change control, but I would not call it a coup as an established fact," he told The Silicon Ledger. Multiple scenarios could explain the reversal: a new board agreement negotiated during those 33 hours, internal or external negotiations, directors reconsidering the practical fallout of removing a founder, or an undisclosed internal resolution.

Milyushkevich emphasized that the real issue for Automattic now is not who prevailed in the dispute, but whether the board and CEO have established a transparent process for resolving future disagreements. "The most important thing Automattic can establish now is not who won the dispute, but whether the board and CEO have a clearly understood process for handling the next serious disagreement," he said.

Ricardo D'Olivar, a behavioral scientist and visiting professor at São Paulo's FIA Business School, framed the concern differently. What matters is whether stakeholders possess "enough information to distinguish a considered correction from an unresolved struggle" over authority. "A reversal of this kind can reflect responsible reconsideration," D'Olivar explained to The Silicon Ledger. "Reinstatement answers who is in charge today. It does not, by itself, explain how a future disagreement would be resolved."

D'Olivar warned that the ambiguity could have ripple effects. "If uncertainty persists, employees may become more cautious about committing to decisions whose backing appears unstable," he noted. Developers and executives considering joining Automattic might worry about whether they would face accountability for decisions they were authorized to make but that the organization later declined to support. Investors, too, may demand clearer evidence that governance and succession planning can withstand pressure.

A pattern in tech leadership

Mullenweg's rapid departure and return may be unusually compressed, but the boomerang CEO is hardly a novelty in technology. Sam Altman stepped down from OpenAI's board following a communication disagreement, only to return to the CEO role five days later after nearly all 700 staff members threatened to resign and Microsoft added its weight to the effort. Steve Jobs was forced out of Apple in 1985 and returned 12 years later to revive the company. Jack Dorsey departed Twitter in 2008 before returning as CEO in 2015. Michael Dell relinquished the CEO title in 2004 to become chairman, then resumed the role by early 2007.

Whether Automattic's episode mirrors these historical precedents or represents a unique boardroom struggle remains unclear. Until Mullenweg offers his own account, the WordPress ecosystem has gained an unexpected subplot worthy of Hollywood.