The Shell executive who told staff on a controversial project in Siberia to follow him or get out of his way has decided to get out of the way of the oil and gas group instead, it emerged yesterday.

A spokesman for Shell confirmed that David Greer had resigned two weeks after the gung-ho contents of a motivational email he sent to staff were published across the world.

Greer, who was deputy chief executive of the Sakhalin-2 project in offshore Siberia, used the email to berate supposed "cowards" who may have been holding up pipeline work on the giant scheme.

"Lead me, follow me or get out of my way," he wrote in the email, which exemplifies the potential pitfalls associated with adopting an overly personal tone in the eminently leakable medium.

Greer may now have time to reflect on his observation in the email that: "Success is how we bounce when we are on the bottom."