The most senior editor at Fairfax Media, the editorial director, Sean Aylmer, has resigned suddenly after 20 years with the newspaper publisher.
“Today is my last day at Fairfax,” he told staff in an email on Tuesday afternoon.
“It has been an honour and a privilege working with you all for so long. Keep doing what you’re doing and Fairfax has a bright future.”
Sources told Guardian Australia Aylmer had been called to a meeting with the chief executive, Greg Hywood, late on Monday. Staff said they were blindsided by the unexplained resignation.
In a second group email the managing director of Australian Metro Publishing, Chris Janz, thanked Aylmer for a “distinguished career” at Fairfax.
“We are grateful to Sean for the immense contribution he has made,” Janz said. “He has led an incredible publishing transformation and modernisation of our newsrooms – and overseen some of the best journalism in our company’s history.”
Aylmer was the executive who oversaw Fairfax’s “transformation” which saw dozens of journalists made redundant and editorial lines streamlined. The company has indicated it is moving from a newspaper model towards a digital-only company.
The restructuring led to industrial action by journalists at the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age.
Aylmer joined the the Sydney Morning Herald in 1997 after a stint as an economist at the Reserve Bank of Australia.
