Carol Bartz steps down from Yahoo board of directors

Former Yahoo chief executive Carol Bartz has stepped down from her position on the company's board of directors just a few days after being unceremoniously sacked.

"On September 9 2011, Carol Bartz resigned from the board of directors of Yahoo, effective immediately," the company said in statement seen by Reuters.

The presence of Bartz on the board appeared unlikely to last after she branded fellow board members "doofuses" in an interview with Fortune magazine, and said that she had been "f***ed over" by Yahoo.

Bartz is rumoured to be receiving a severance package worth around $14m, although reports have suggested that insulting her fellow board members could see her lose a further $10m by breaching a non-disparagement clause.

Bartz was sacked by Yahoo chairman Roy Bostock in a telephone call last week in a move that surprised some in the industry given that she appeared to be taking the necessary steps to turn the ailing company's fortunes around.

Yahoo has struggled for market share in the face of competition from Google in several areas, including search, email and advertising.

The firm signed a 10-year deal with Microsoft in 2009 to use Bing to power Yahoo search results in an effort to fight back against Google, but subsequently blamed a 28 per cent drop in first-quarter profits in 2011 on a  technical issue with the partnership.