> But that’s the trouble: Marissa Mayer wasn’t hired to do the safe thing. She was picked to be bold, and so far, she has failed.
While I agree that Mayer's term hasn't been great...I never got the impression that she was hired to do move fast and break things until Yahoo was back in the game with Google...wasn't the hot take that she could be counted not to screw things up as Yahoo's investors struck it big on the Alibaba investment? Was there ever the implication that the board would be cool with it if she decided to go for broke in such a way to spoil the Alibaba windfall?
However things end up for her, I hope we get to hear a little more about their acquisition strategy. Tumblr seemed like a reasonable thing (though sure, Yahoo doesn't seem to have done much to capitalize on it)...but what about all the other acquihires that were ostensibly done to bring in engineering talent? How many of those engineers stuck around to become pioneers within the company? I think shoveling out millions to bring in unique talent is a great idea...but I'm guessing there's a huge difference between giving a suitcase of $30M in cash to bring in someone like Peter Norvig/Jeff Dean/Guido/etc, versus bringing in a 17-year-old entrepreneur [1].
Yahoo did receive a lot of attention for the money it used to bring in media superstars such as Katie Couric and David Pogue...but speaking as someone who has worked in journalism...that's not a viable strategy for turning around a tech company.
I hope one acquisition Yahoo makes is Foursquare/Swarm...I hear so little about 4SQ that I have to wonder if it's on life support (though maybe I'm vastly underestimating how popular it is in NY compared to SF?)...having another location-based social service between Google and Yelp seems as vital as keeping Tumblr around in the fight between the web and Facebook...and location data and engineering seems like it could find an easier fit into whatever Yahoo's tech strategy is (versus, say, buying Path/TaskRabbit/Lyft/Quora/Evernote, etc)
> but what about all the other acquihires that were ostensibly done to bring in engineering talent?
I can't speak for the other acquisitions, but at Tumblr it's safe to say that nearly all engineering talent that was there pre-acquisition has left. I'm not able to speak to reasons why, but suffice to say, if acquiring Tumblr was intended to be an acquihire, the plan failed.
it seems like there is a wave of critical articles about Mayer's tenure and results (mostly lack of it). I'd wish it were that people are finally starting to see the reality. Unfortunately, i think, it is just some activist investors causing that wave. A wave of the same pure buzz/hype type that was the "Mayer admiration" wave in the beginning.
Seems like these articles can be written by anyone. "She wasn't bold, blah, blah". And if she was bold and failed "She was being too risky, blah, blah".
This is an easy assessment to make, to say she didn't do something risky without considering that something risky would have a big chance to fail spectacularly.
The comparison to Apple is particularly interesting. Before Jobs came on board, many people suggested Apple to ditch the hardware business and focus on software, like Microsoft did. In the end, Jobs came in with the unheard of idea of building attractive hardware. Who would have anticipated that?
This article provides no insights, but it's not wrong either. Shortly after Marissa took over, she became obsessed over minutia like tweaking the Yahoo! logo font[1] and making the homepage “fresh and dynamic”[2]. Oh brother.
Still, she she deserves credit for making Flickr much better, and for shrewd acquisitions like Tumblr.
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 29.2 ms ] threadWhile I agree that Mayer's term hasn't been great...I never got the impression that she was hired to do move fast and break things until Yahoo was back in the game with Google...wasn't the hot take that she could be counted not to screw things up as Yahoo's investors struck it big on the Alibaba investment? Was there ever the implication that the board would be cool with it if she decided to go for broke in such a way to spoil the Alibaba windfall?
However things end up for her, I hope we get to hear a little more about their acquisition strategy. Tumblr seemed like a reasonable thing (though sure, Yahoo doesn't seem to have done much to capitalize on it)...but what about all the other acquihires that were ostensibly done to bring in engineering talent? How many of those engineers stuck around to become pioneers within the company? I think shoveling out millions to bring in unique talent is a great idea...but I'm guessing there's a huge difference between giving a suitcase of $30M in cash to bring in someone like Peter Norvig/Jeff Dean/Guido/etc, versus bringing in a 17-year-old entrepreneur [1].
Yahoo did receive a lot of attention for the money it used to bring in media superstars such as Katie Couric and David Pogue...but speaking as someone who has worked in journalism...that's not a viable strategy for turning around a tech company.
I hope one acquisition Yahoo makes is Foursquare/Swarm...I hear so little about 4SQ that I have to wonder if it's on life support (though maybe I'm vastly underestimating how popular it is in NY compared to SF?)...having another location-based social service between Google and Yelp seems as vital as keeping Tumblr around in the fight between the web and Facebook...and location data and engineering seems like it could find an easier fit into whatever Yahoo's tech strategy is (versus, say, buying Path/TaskRabbit/Lyft/Quora/Evernote, etc)
[1] http://allthingsd.com/20130325/yahoo-paid-30-million-in-cash...
Why would you hire someone with a background in products if you don't want to see new products?
I can't speak for the other acquisitions, but at Tumblr it's safe to say that nearly all engineering talent that was there pre-acquisition has left. I'm not able to speak to reasons why, but suffice to say, if acquiring Tumblr was intended to be an acquihire, the plan failed.
This is an easy assessment to make, to say she didn't do something risky without considering that something risky would have a big chance to fail spectacularly.
The comparison to Apple is particularly interesting. Before Jobs came on board, many people suggested Apple to ditch the hardware business and focus on software, like Microsoft did. In the end, Jobs came in with the unheard of idea of building attractive hardware. Who would have anticipated that?
Xbox and Surface says hi.
Well... Microsoft helped destroy Sega with the Dreamcast...
Still, she she deserves credit for making Flickr much better, and for shrewd acquisitions like Tumblr.
She made Yahoo! better. No failure in that.
[1]http://humancode.us/post/60431192797/marissas-tumblr-geeking...
[2]http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/bits/2013/02/20/marissa-maye...