The Google-fication of Yahoo! 242
Hugh Pickens writes "Since coming to Yahoo!, CEO Marissa Mayer has added a weekly, Friday afternoon all-hands meeting, just like at Google; she announced that henceforth the food in Yahoo's URLs Cafe will be free, just like at Google; and she has begun prepping major changes to the layout of the work spaces and buildings of Yahoo to make it feel more collaborative and cool, just like, well.. you get the idea. Such focus on improving cultural issues is an interesting initial move by the neophyte CEO, since the care and feeding and, most of all, cosseting of employees has been a critical element to Google's success at creating an always-sunny work environment. But Mayer has been up to much more serious business, said several sources, especially product innovation as the savior for Yahoo: Better email! Better search! Better ad-serving! And a special plea to make Flickr awesome again! In other words, better every product Yahoo has to offer. 'This is the sound of Yahoo becoming a technology company again,' says one source. 'It will be all about platforms and products.' Sources say that will likely mean a big splashy tech or product deal in the days ahead, perhaps via an acquisition to signal the new direction, perhaps with the acquisition of a sexy product like Flipboard. In the meantime, many at Yahoo are bracing for a pack of current and former Googlers — Mayer had a lot of loyal staffers — to come on board, writes Kara Swisher. 'And, by the looks of all the Googley changes at Yahoo, they'll feel right at home when they get there.'"
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
It's amazing that a CEO can come in and say "Make a better product!" and it comes as a shock to everyone. And I don't want to take away from what she's doing, on the contrary, I applaud it. Focusing on employees and quality products versus focusing on financials and Wall Street is a huge step in the right direction for any company. It's just sad that it's newsworthy.
Missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)
"since the care and feeding and, most of all, cosseting of employees has been a critical element to Google's success at creating an always-sunny work environment"
Actually, the first and foremost reason for Google's success has been its people. And Yahoo has been taking a beating long enough not to have the same caliber of individuals at this point...so cosseting them isn't exactly going to give the same results as Google gets for taking care of their own employees. Not that it isn't a good idea, but I think Yahoo needs to come up with more compelling reasons to work for them, instead of an up-and-comer (which they absolutely are not, unfortunately). I'm a huge fan of companies providing perks for their people; both scientific studies and my own personal experience show that you get a much bigger ROI on those than on straight salary bumps, for the most part. But they aren't going to improve your company's bottom line automatically.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Hell, it would be nice to have one good search engine at this point.
Re:Googlizing won't save Yahoo. (Score:5, Insightful)
Not sufficient, true. But the thing a new CEO needs most of all is time, and making some trivial but highly visible and generally popular changes that can be implemented in hours will buy her the time to actually address real problems, while giving the press something to talk about besides her uterus. The lady ain't dumb.
Re:I use Yahoo to avoid Google (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Hear hear!
It's sad to see clueless MBAs come into tech companies and try to cut their way to profitability. It never works, but they keep trying it again and again (cue famous quote about the definition of insanity...).
About time somebody tried a different approach: take care of your people, and build great products. And remember that nobody does great work with an axe hanging over their head.
Time to buy some Yahoo! stock - they've found themselves a CEO with a clue.
Re:Fix Yahoo / Flickr (Score:4, Insightful)
This sort of thing is where I think it's important that the CEO of a company drink the proverbial kool-aid and actually try and use their own products. Mayer is a geek - if she tries to use any yahoo services she'll probably find what is redundant, what is broken, and what is missing. All things yahoo needs. Badly.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
It's sad to see clueless MBAs come into tech companies and try to cut their way to profitability. It never works, but they keep trying it again and again (cue famous quote about the definition of insanity...).
No, it does work- for them. The aim is to raise profits in the short term- which is also what the markets are concerned with- while they're still at the company and collecting large pay packets, bonuses, etc. etc.
The fact that this doesn't work over the long term is irrelevant, as they'll be long out of the company by that point.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)