Marni Walden, EVP and president of Global Media at Verizon, revealed she decided to leave the company after it became apparent she would not take over as CEO.

“I have had an amazing journey at Verizon…[but] I also had aspirations at some point in my journey to maybe do something different,” Walden said onstage at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit, which ran this week in Washington D.C.

“There was one other job at Verizon and it became clear that job potentially wasn’t going to be mine and so I thought I’m going to take a risk and go do something different.”

Walden clarified her departure is not related to the recent news a 2013 security breach at Yahoo impacted many more accounts than previously thought.

The EVP did not reveal what her next step will be, but noted a one-year non-compete clause in her employment agreement means she’ll have to take what she jokingly called a “forced vacation”.

“I’m not telling you what I’m doing yet…We’ll see where it leads,” she said.

Walden joined Verizon 27 years ago, starting in retail and working her way up through the ranks to a number two position at the company reporting directly to current CEO Lowell McAdam. She is set to step down from her role at the end of December and leave the company entirely in February.