Kirstine Stewart, Twitter’s vice-president of media, North America, is leaving the company.
A Twitter spokesperson confirmed the departure to Marketing, but declined to comment further.
In her most recent role at the social media company, Stewart was responsible for its North American media partnerships television, sports, gaming, talent, music, fashion, news and government. It was a position she held for nearly two years and an important part of the business as Twitter tries to drive new revenue with more traditional media partners.
Stewart made headlines in 2013 when she left her post as executive vice-president of English Services at CBC/Radio-Canada to lead the just-launched Twitter Canada. She had been with the public broadcaster for seven years and was credited with expanding CBC’s digital offerings.
Stewart is regarded as one of Canada’s foremost female executives, and last year penned a book called Our Turn that explores leadership qualities and how women are best suited to bring them to the C-suite.
In an interview with Marketing earlier this year, Stewart discussed a strong belief in overcoming doubts and hesitations when it comes time to make a new career move.
“As crass as it may sound, you have to just get over yourself, and believe that if someone has decided that you are worthy of an opportunity that you really are,” she said. “We put so much pressure on structure and management decisions in business, which means when it comes to our own careers or lives that we tend to not make these decisions lightly. But when you have the right opportunity, the biggest regrets come when you didn’t take that next step forward.”
Twitter’s media team has been hit with a number of key departures this year, according to tech website Recode. The list includes former VP of global media Katie Stanton, her successor, Nathan Hubbard a few months later as well as the heads of North American sports partnerships, and TV cable partnerships.
Twitter has shown signs of struggling of late. In its fourth quarter, Twitter said monthly active users dropped from 307 million in the third quarter to 305 million. The company lost $90 million during the final three months of last year, and has never reported a profit. Revenue rose 48% from the previous year to $710 million, providing some measure of hope that the service can still be turned into a viable business. However a report from eMarketer predicted the company’s user base would grow by double digits by the end of this year.
It’s worth noting that despite leaving the company, Stewart remains highly active on Twitter (though she has yet to change her profile bio), continuing to post throughout Thursday night and Friday morning. She told Marketing that for brands in particular, the power of the medium has been transformative.
“It’s much harder to make those faux-pas when anyone can now comment on a campaign they didn’t particularly like,” she said. “There is a community at work out there that supports change and drives it.”
