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Joanne Bradford's rapid climb up the Microsoft ladder took her all the way out of the company and away from her job as chief media officer over MSN.

After seven years with Microsoft, Bradford must have felt it was time to set out for greener pastures. Los Angeles-based Spot Runner announced their hiring of Bradford to head up national marketing services for the company.

Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog noted the announcement by Spot Runner, and found that Greg Nelson, former general manager of MSN International reporting to Bradford, will take over her job on an interim basis.

Bradford had been moving up the corporate organizational chart quickly in recent years. Before gaining the chief media officer/corporate VP job, Bradford ran Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions as corporate VP and chief media revenue officer.

Her boss at Microsoft, Steve Berkowitz, was already on track to leave Microsoft before the end of 2008, as Mary Jo Foley noted. She also cited a quieter Microsoft departure, Amir Majidimehr, corporate vice president for Microsoft’s Consumer Media Technology Group.

It appears Majidimehr had been adrift within the Microsoft arcology since October, when his Consumer Media Technologies group was absorbed into a couple of other groups. Being someone who worked on promoting the now-doomed HD DVD format probably didn't help his situation.