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In many ways, Monday will be like any other day at the Redmond, Wash., headquarters of the world's largest software maker. Microsoft workers will still come to work to tackle the same array of technological and business challenges facing the company. For the first time in the company's 33-year history, however, one of those employees won't be William Henry Gates III -- better known as Bill -- at the company he founded after dropping out of Harvard. Gates' last day as a full-time employee is Friday.

Phil Hester has exited the chief technology officer post at Advanced Micro Devices, according to reports, and he won't be replaced. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based manufacturer of computer processors, which reported more than $6 billion in revenue in 2007 and trails only Intel in that market, reportedly announced Hester's resignation last week and said it is not looking to fill the position. Hester, who came to AMD after more than 20 years at IBM, primarily oversaw AMD's development of Fusion, an accelerated processing unit.

Few people would dispute the mystique that surrounds the boardroom. This allure has been around for some time, but it was recently heightened by the popular TV series "The Apprentice" with business icon Donald Trump. Boards of directors deal with sensitive issues and handle privileged information, and board meetings themselves call to mind strategy discussion, stock discussions and major contracts. Taking advantaged of privileged information is illegal. As you can imagine, access to privileged financial and stock information could easily be used for insider trading.

If Meg Whitman validates media reports that she is exiting the CEO post at eBay, she will depart with the glow of having finished a masterful job of transforming an obscure San Jose, Calif.-based auction site into an archetypal business model with yearly global sales of nearly $6 billion. "Think about what eBay was," said Greg Sterling, principal analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence. "It was like an online garage sale when it started. Now, it's one of the true Internet powerhouses."

Microsoft has fired its chief information officer, saying he violated company policies, but a spokesperson declined to give the exact reason for the dismissal. "Stuart Scott's employment with Microsoft was terminated after an investigation for violation of company policies," said Microsoft spokesperson Lou Gellos, reading from a company statement Tuesday. Scott was dismissed Friday, Gellos said. He would not elaborate further. According to Microsoft's Web site, Scott was responsible for the information technology infrastructure at the world's largest software maker.