In recent weeks, the staff at Politico noticed nearly all of its bosses — including the political publication’s founders, Jim VandeHei and John F. Harris — going in and out of meetings at its sleek new offices in Virginia.
On Thursday the reason became clear. Mr. VandeHei, who is also chief executive, Politico’s star reporter Mike Allen and three other key executives announced they would leave the company in the coming months.
Despite the staff’s suspicions about the many meetings — “if they hadn’t noticed, they are probably working in the wrong place,” Mr. Harris said of his reporters — the announcement shocked the newsroom, and the political media establishment, of which Politico had become an integral part.
In interviews on Friday, Mr. Harris, now Politico’s publisher and editor in chief, and its owner, Robert Allbritton, dismissed reports that any tension among the organization’s leaders had led to the departures.
“I think Jim really wants to run his own company, and at the end of the day, that is the one thing I cannot offer him,” Mr. Allbritton said.
In a separate interview, Mr. VandeHei said his departure was very much a personal choice, and was not prompted by any disagreement or awkwardness, as reflected by the long transition period before his departure.
“I have been at this a decade, and I have my own ambitions,” he said.
The decisions were announced at once, Mr. Harris said, because he had worried that a series of announcements might prompt further speculation and intrigue in the newsroom and outside.
Mr. VandeHei, Mr. Allen and Roy Schwartz, the chief revenue officer, will depart after the November presidential election. The chief operating officer, Kim Kingsley, and the executive vice president for expansion, Danielle Jones, will leave sooner.
Mr. VandeHei and Mr. Allen will most likely start a venture together, with Mr. Schwartz, according to a person with knowledge of their plans who spoke on condition of anonymity. It will not be a direct competitor to Politico, the person said.
Politico was founded in 2007 with a few employees, and has grown to employ nearly 500 worldwide. It has established a business model that combines lucrative “pro” subscriptions for insiders, with revenue from advertising and events, and it has recently been expanding its reach. It started a European operation, in partnership with the German media company Axel Springer, and has begun an expansion into statehouses across the United States, now the front line for many national political issues.
Politico’s leaders had routinely debated those moves and their timing, Mr. Harris said. “I’d say over the past few years, there were really vigorous discussions about whether Europe was something for someday, or right now,” he said. “Robert thought right now, a year or so ago,” he said, and the company pursued that expansion. “The states, Jim felt strongly about, and he made an enthusiast out of Robert — but he had to answer a lot of legitimate, tough-minded questions.”
The departures are a transition point for Politico, Mr. Harris, Mr. Allbritton and Susan Glasser, its editor, said.
“This is a problem that all successful start-ups have,” Mr. Allbritton said. “They have to learn how to manage their growth. It’s maybe a bit strange that this is happening in journalism as opposed to tech.”
The executives who remain, he said, are the ones who have been most intimately involved with the company’s expansions. Politico will hire at least 50 people in the coming year and successors for those who have left. None of the planned new endeavors — including more reporting on finance — will come at the expense of what Ms. Glasser called “high-velocity scoop reporting.”
The Playbook morning email franchise, which Mr. Allen made his own over years of high-metabolism reporting, will be expanded, Mr. Harris said, though it will not try to replicate Mr. Allen’s unique style. “Journalism in many cases is driven by people with distinctive, individual voices,” he said.
Mr. Allbritton said that Politico had repaid its initial investment within three years of its founding, and that money it now makes goes back into the business to support the expansion. It remains the case, he said, that any new project must support itself financially in about three years. “My intention with the company is to continue the strategy we have proposed, with serious and meaningful growth and the serious investment that comes with that — tens of millions of dollars,” he said. He declined to disclose specific details of the company’s financial performance.
The departures, Mr. Harris said, were not a divorce in the face of that growth, but a graduation, a bittersweet moment.
Mr. Allbritton said that Mr. VandeHei and Mr. Allen had not sought to start their venture within Politico — a move that would have echoed how Politico was founded. Mr. VandeHei and Mr. Harris were working at The Washington Post, where they proposed the idea before striking out on their own.
Mr. VandeHei concurred. “I can’t say that it’s not an emotional decision,” he said. “If you have a start-up it’s in your bones, it becomes a part of who you are.”