The Black Music Action Coalition says the executive exits at Universal Music Group this month raise “questions about who will lead next.” In a statement printed by Billboard on October 19, 2026, BMAC warned that Black executives, women and other underrepresented professionals “still face barriers” to lasting leadership roles at the major labels, and asked whether restructuring is “opening pathways or narrowing them.”
The trigger was the wave of senior exits at UMG reported on October 14, as its €250 million (about $270 million) cost-cutting program continued. We covered who is leaving Universal and why last week. BMAC's question is a different one: not who left, but who is being trained to take the chair next.
Which executives is BMAC talking about?
The statement's main text names no one. Billboard's report on it lists the exits, and one BMAC board member names the person at the center of it. Here is who, as reported as of October 20, 2026.
| Executive | Role | What is reported |
|---|---|---|
| Tunji Balogun | Chairman and CEO, Def Jam | Will exit UMG by the end of the year (MBW); named in August 2021, in the job since January 2022 |
| Nicole Wyskoarko | President, head of urban A&R, Interscope Geffen A&M | Leaving; received BMAC's first Sylvia Rhone Visionary Award on Sept. 24 (Billboard) |
| Sam Riback | Co-president, head of pop/rock A&R, Interscope Geffen A&M | Leaving (Billboard, MBW) |
| Rob Femia | COO, MCA Nashville | Laid off (Billboard) |
| Miranda McDonald | Senior VP, promotion and regional marketing, MCA Nashville | Laid off (Billboard) |
| Sylvia Rhone | Chair and CEO, Epic Records (Sony) | Stepped down in September 2025 (Rolling Stone, The Hollywood Reporter) |
Republic Records CEO Jim Roppo also left UMG, to become vice chairman of Warner Records. Nobody in the reports we read had named a new head of Def Jam as of October 20.
Why does Balogun's exit matter so much to BMAC?
Because of who was left after Rhone. Rhone became the first Black woman to head a major record company when Atlantic gave her its EastWest label, Rolling Stone recalled when she left Epic. BMAC board member Naima Cochrane drew the line from her to Def Jam:
When Sylvia Rhone … stepped down last year, she was the only remaining Black woman heading a major almost 35 years after shattering that ceiling. Now, with Tunji Balogun's departure, we're facing the very real possibility of an industry where Black executives are completely absent from the helm of major record labels.Naima Cochrane, BMAC executive board member, statement via Billboard
The statement also takes aim at how exits are handled: “Some executives have received celebrated, carefully managed departures, while others have not been afforded the same respect.” Its business case is blunt: “A diverse workplace is a profitable business strategy, not charity.”
What did BMAC's report cards find about the pipeline?
BMAC has been grading this since 2021. Its first Music Industry Action Report Card, written by Cochrane, scored the three major label groups on four areas, including senior executive representation. Not one got an A in any area, Billboard reported. Warner Music Group got a D for representation, with BMAC noting that no Black executives at the company reported directly to Stephen Cooper, who ran WMG at the time.
The finding that reads loudest now is the pipeline one. Companies donated money, the report said, but “few created mechanisms to tackle and change issues and systems such as talent and promotion pipelines internally.” A follow-up, the 2022 Music in Action Report, is posted beside it on BMAC's site.
Five years on, the question has moved from who gets hired to who is left to promote.
What is BMAC asking the labels to do?
President Willie “Prophet” Stiggers pointed at the pledges of 2020: “The tens of millions of dollars pledged to advance racial equity in the music industry were supposed to create lasting change. What if more of that investment had gone toward protecting career pathways, developing future leaders, and building real economic security for the Black and Brown professionals who helped make these companies successful?”
Co-founder Shawn Holiday, a former major label executive, put it in names: “Somewhere out there is the next Berry Gordy, Sylvia Rhone or Andre Harrell. We have to make sure they get their shot.”
For artists, the people in those chairs help decide who gets signed and funded. The first test of BMAC's question is simple to watch: who UMG names to run Def Jam.