Mark Thompson to step down as BBC boss after Olympics | Media | The Guardian

Director general will quit at the end of 2012 or early in 2013 after eight years in charge of public broadcaster ...

Mark Thompson became director general of the BBC after Greg Dyke resigned over the Hutton report. Photograph: Richard Saker ...

... 's director general, has signalled to senior colleagues that he is ready to step down, with insiders believing he will quit at the end of 2012 or early in 2013, at the end of the broadcaster's Olympic year.

Britain's most powerful television executive has not given an exact timetable for his departure, but friends say he acknowledges that he has entered the final chapter of his eight-year director generalship and is "psychologically ready" to leave a job that paid him £779,000 last year.

Thompson, 54, took over the helm at the BBC in the wake of the resignations of Greg Dyke as director general and Gavyn Davies as chairman after stinging criticism of the corporation in ...

Knowledge that Thompson's time is drawing to a close will trigger a succession race that could see a woman appointed to run the BBC for the first time: Caroline Thomson, chief operating officer, and Helen Boaden, head of news, are two of the three best placed internal candidates. Their main rival is the low-key but cerebral George Entwistle, recently appointed head of BBC Vision, the corporation's TV channels.