Insurer Aviva said today its chief executive Andrew Moss had stepped down with immediate effect.
The company was hit last week by one of the biggest pay revolts ever suffered by a British company.
The group said Moss would be replaced by chairman designate John McFarlane in the interim.
Moss had told the company that he believed it was in the best interest of the firm for him to step aside.
Last week Moss waived his 2012 salary increase following shareholder concerns over executive pay, which culminated in half of the group's investors revolting on remuneration at its annual general meeting three days later.
The shock boardroom shake-up comes after 54% of Aviva shareholders voted against the insurer's remuneration report. Including abstentions, almost 59% of investors refused to endorse the group's executive pay policy, in a result announced at Aviva's annual general meeting last Thursday in London.
The rejection vote was non-binding but nevertheless a major embarrassment for Aviva, which is Britain's second-biggest insurance company after Prudential.
Aviva's defeat came despite Moss bowing to investor pressure and waiving a pay rise that would have taken his salary above £1m sterling.
Moss was last month awarded a 4.6% increase on his annual salary of £960,000 but decided to decline it.
