Stephen Lansdown has resigned from his role as executive director of Hargreaves Lansdown, the UK-based wealth advisory firm which he co-founded, and has been appointed as a non-executive director.  

Under the provisions of the UK Code of Corporate Governance, Lansdown will not be considered independent due to his prior role as executive director.

His resignation comes after the announcement in April that fellow co-founder Peter Hargeaves would be stepping down from his position as chief executive on 2 September 2010. He will remain an executive director.

In other board-level changes at the firm, Ian Gorham, deputy CEO, has been named as an executive director. Gorham joined Hargreaves Lansdown in 2009, and is due to take over as chief executive on Hargreaves’ departure.

Meanwhile, Chris Barling has been appointed as an independent non-executive director. Barling has 30 years’ experience in the IT industry, including senior roles at Cable & Wireless and Reuters.

“These appointments show a total complement of eight directors, of whom three are executives, four are non-executives, although only three can be deemed as independent, and myself as non-executive chairman. Whilst this is not in strict compliance with the UK Code of Governance, we believe it is a strong board to support our new chief executive, and importantly retains the ongoing input of the two founders who remain the largest shareholders in the company," said Mike Evans, chairman of Hargreaves Lansdown.