Adobe CEO to Spend More Time With Family, Learning Creative Suite

If Adobe Chief Executive Officer Bruce Chizen planned to quit while he was ahead, he couldn’t have picked a better time. When Chizen steps down as CEO at the end of this month, to be succeeded Dec. 1 by Adobe COO Shantanu Narayen, he will depart a company that’s flourishing financially. Adobe posted better-than-expected third quarter results in September and expects to post fourth-quarter revenue “near the high end” of its target range.

So why resign?

“As any CEO will attest, the job of chief executive is all-consuming,” Chizen said during a call with analysts. “Quite simply, I’m at a point in my life where I would like to take a step back and think about what I would like to do in the next stage of my life. As much as I love Adobe products and employees, I didn’t want to find myself at 55 saying, ‘Gee, I wish I had done something else besides Adobe.’ ” What will he do next? “It could be that I do nothing, travel, sit on boards, run another company, invest in another company. I don’t know–nor would I ever know if I didn’t decide to take a break.”