Everyday Encounters: A former CEO reflects on a career of ‘fixing broken corporations’

Part-time Tiburon resident Maury Myers built a career in business, as he puts it during a conversation Dec. 2 at Shoreline Park alongside mini labradoodle Freddy, ‘fixing broken corporations.’ His last clean-up was a roughly five-year stint at Waste Management, Inc. on the heels of an insider-trading scandal. (Francisco Martinez / The Ark)

Maury Myers spent decades rushing into corporate disasters. Now, at 85, his biggest daily challenge is keeping up with Freddy, his 15-year-old miniature labradoodle, during walks through Shoreline Park near downtown Tiburon.

“He forces me to get out and walk him and get some exercise — and he’s very smart,” Myers says Dec. 2. “So he’s a lot of fun to deal with.”

The part-time Tiburon resident, who splits his year between four months here and eight in Honolulu, retired roughly two decades ago after building a reputation as a corporate “cleaner.”

“I got into the business of fixing broken corporations,” Myers says.

His final turnaround came at Waste Management Inc., where he served as chairman and CEO from November 1999 to 2005. He was the company’s sixth CEO in three years, hired to rescue a firm reporting $250 million in missed financial projections, hemorrhaging stock value and facing class-action lawsuits over insider-trading allegations. The company settled those lawsuits in 2001 for $457 million.

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