Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units • Hacker News Board

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#171

Post by spikels » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:27 PM UTC

nobleach wrote: post #99

legohead wrote: post #6

So I guess she did mean something when she said, "No layoffs...this week" [1] Brutal. [1] http://nypost.com/2016/01/18/marissa-mayers-job-safety-joke-...

It's incredibly sad when something like this happens. And I sure hope anyone who's found themselves out of a job, success in finding another. Even the "lower performers" still need to work. What I do hope for Yahoo, is that they're taking a solid look at who they consider expendable. Are self-important big shots also losing their jobs? Or are they too important to fire? When I see any company start to get rid of thei…

Tumblr gets little respect but it was one of the better purchases Yahoo made. It actually generates revenue. Many of the others were shut down months later with neither revenue, talent or technology to show for it.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#172

Post by pcurve » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:37 PM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #5

I feel bad for the 15%, but this was necessary. They are severely over-hired. I've gone over there a few times to talk to folks and it's clear that they have a lot of people that are basically making work for themselves because no one has any work for them that actually helps the business.

Once a Japanese executive said, "It doesn't matter if you fire bottom 20%. Eventually the existing employees will form the new bottom 20%".

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#173

Post by Riod » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:37 PM UTC

As a post mortem of sorts, could someone with an understanding of yahoo from the inside explain why they have failed to innovate for 10+ years?

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#174

Post by meat_fist » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:45 PM UTC

spikels wrote: post #171

nobleach wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's incredibly sad when something like this happens. And I sure hope anyone who's found themselves out of a job, success in finding another. Even the "lower performers" still need to work. What I do hope for Yahoo, is that they're taking a solid look at who they consider expendable. Are self-important big shots also losing their jobs? Or are they too important to fire? When I see any company start to get rid of thei…

Tumblr gets little respect but it was one of the better purchases Yahoo made. It actually generates revenue. Many of the others were shut down months later with neither revenue, talent or technology to show for it.

Do you have a source for this? I can only find posts from several years ago saying Tumblr will soon be profitable.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#175

Post by Someone1234 » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:45 PM UTC

anotherhacker wrote: post #165

henrikschroder wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously, if you've ever worked at a large company in SV, you should know that the "lavish parties" thing was a completely envy-driven red herring. If you do the math you realize that the holiday party cost a few hundred bucks per attending employee. Compared to other large SV companies - that are not under fire in the press - this was a cheap holiday party.

Lavish parties send the wrong message to employees. If I were CEO I'd say: "No more parties. We're going to use the to retrain employees (instead of firing them) and avoid layoffs." Mayer is turing out to be a terrible CEO. This article describes the various multi-million dollar parties. http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-ceo-marissa-mayer-blows...

That article is really damning. Makes it seem like she is going to cash out as Yahoo! goes down in flames around her. All she needs to do right now is keep it alive long enough to cash out all of her stock...

Someone remind me again why corporations pay their CEOs over 100m/year? And tell me about value, that's a huge chunk of change for someone in Yahoo!'s position, they could use that money to keep employees working.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#176

Post by henrikschroder » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 10:56 PM UTC

jqm wrote: post #155

henrikschroder wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously, if you've ever worked at a large company in SV, you should know that the "lavish parties" thing was a completely envy-driven red herring. If you do the math you realize that the holiday party cost a few hundred bucks per attending employee. Compared to other large SV companies - that are not under fire in the press - this was a cheap holiday party.

A few hundred bucks per attending employee for a Christmas party is a lot by most working people's standards... probably like 12x + what their company would spend.

Yes, by most people's standards, which is why the piece is working, it creates envy in a lot of people. Same with the "free food" spiel.

But Yahoo is competing for Silicon Valley software engineers, and perks are very common, so if you don't have free food, free snacks, office parties, events, and other benefits, you'll have to pay your employees a lot more.

Perks are incredibly cheap for the company, because people value them much more than they would the corresponding pay raise.

So if you don't understand this, it looks bad that company "wastes" millions on perks, because you don't see the many more millions it saves on salary.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#177

Post by dopkew » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 11:00 PM UTC

There is a movie dialogue where a man from the future tells his friend in the past:"I want you to remember this word, okay? It's kind of like a code word: Yahoo. Can you remember that?" It ends up making his friend rich in the future. The movie is Frequency(2000)

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#178

Post by TallGuyShort » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 11:01 PM UTC

adevine wrote: post #124

jpetso wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is some value in providing jobs to 10,000 people (currently more, soon a little less) even if there's no extra profit for shareholders on top of that. Maybe these kinds of companies should just be given to employees for free and run as a co-op instead of getting shut down.

Wut? There are charities, and there are businesses. If you expect Yahoo to be run as a charity, why should Yahoo's owners be the ones who must provide this? Put it another way. Let's say you had 100k that you were able to invest in your own startup. After a number of years, you found that you could support 5 employees at your startup, but you weren't, and had no hope of, being profitable - there was no "extra profit"…

I agree a business is not a charity, but if there is no hope of a return on your investment, what value is there in doing literally anything else with it? There's is definitely value in making it possible for thousands of people to keep food on the table for their families and pay the mortgage and continue providing services to existing users.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#179

Post by spikels » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 11:03 PM UTC

meat_fist wrote: post #174

spikels wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tumblr gets little respect but it was one of the better purchases Yahoo made. It actually generates revenue. Many of the others were shut down months later with neither revenue, talent or technology to show for it.

Do you have a source for this? I can only find posts from several years ago saying Tumblr will soon be profitable.

About a year ago Yahoo said they expected Tumblr to generate $100 million in revenue (not profit) in 2015. I'm not saying Tumblr is profitable (don't think they ever said) or it was a great investment (cost $1.1B in 2013) but at least it generates significant revenue and uniques have around doubled since they bought it.

That was a RELATIVELY good purchase.

Re: Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

#180

Post by henrikschroder » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 11:04 PM UTC

anotherhacker wrote: post #165

henrikschroder wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously, if you've ever worked at a large company in SV, you should know that the "lavish parties" thing was a completely envy-driven red herring. If you do the math you realize that the holiday party cost a few hundred bucks per attending employee. Compared to other large SV companies - that are not under fire in the press - this was a cheap holiday party.

Lavish parties send the wrong message to employees. If I were CEO I'd say: "No more parties. We're going to use the to retrain employees (instead of firing them) and avoid layoffs." Mayer is turing out to be a terrible CEO. This article describes the various multi-million dollar parties. http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-ceo-marissa-mayer-blows...

That's not how it works. That's a terrible suggestion.

If you cut perks, your best and brightest will leave much quicker, the elves leave middle earth. And then your company is essentially screwed, because you'll lose all of your key personnel. And you won't save very much money. This is the way of the bean-counters who know nothing of human motivation and morale. $1000 per employee is less than a percentage of their yearly salary.

If you instead decimate the company, many who survive the culling will be thankful to the company that they are keeping their job, and you'll actually save ~10% in salary costs and future obligations.

(The clever employees who see this coming will leave way before either scenario anyway)