Microsoft CIO Stuart Scott is out

Stuart Scott, who joined Microsoft in 2005 as Corporate Vice President and Chief Information Officer, has left was ousted from the company, as of November 5 for violating company policies, Microsoft officials said.

According to a statement from a Microsoft spokesperson:

"We can confirm that Stuart Scott was terminated after an investigation for violation of company policies , and have no further information to share. "

Before joining Microsoft, Scott worked for 17 years at General Electric, where he held a variety of roles. Most recently, he was the CIO for several divisions there.

Scott reported to Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner.

Scott's departure seems somewhat abrupt. In late October, Scott appeared on stage with Turner at an InformationWeek 500 conference. At that conference, Scott spoke about his work to centralize Microsoft's IT operations. From a write-up of his October appearance at the conference:

"One of Scott's biggest efforts to date has been to centralize IT operations, pulling functions in from the business units and in some cases stomping out "shadow IT" functions that inevitably sprout in such a tech-smart company. The company has consolidated 26 data centers to five and eliminated about 1,000 applications in two years, with the goal of taking out another 1,000."

I asked Microsoft for comment as to why Scott left and/or who will succeed him and updated the post with their response above. Still no word on who will succeed Scott.

One more update from the spokespeople in the know:

"In the interim, Microsoft General Manager Shahla Aly and Corporate Vice President Alain Crozier will assume Stuart's responsibilities until a replacement is identified."