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Yahoo to cut 15 percent jobs, close several units

reuters.com

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

#271

Post by SilasX »

cballard wrote: post #233
vacri wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One night a year is onerous? For an event that it seems your coworkers enjoy?

We spent, I'd say, over $1500 for our party at a company of 15. Yes, I would prefer a $100 bonus. The amount might decrease to the point that it's useless at larger companies due to economies of scale...

Hm... is such a party both a) deductible as a corporate expense and b) not treated as employee income?

If so, the choice is really between "$100 worth" of partying and $65 of after-tax cash.

For that matter, do corporations pay sales tax? If not, it's more like $100 of partying vs $58 of your choice of any consumption.

(Hence why it's not always as simple as "just give me the money".)

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

#272

Post by LoSboccacc »

jazzyk wrote: post #249
prostoalex wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we probably all agree that Yahoo's investors didn't get their money's worth on a marquee CEO Disagree. If you bought YHOO in mid-2012 before Marissa joined, you'd have doubled your investment by now. I understand there's the option value of having invested in some better stocks, and YHOO's correlation to BABA, but one could still do a lot worse than doubling the investment. https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&ch…

Yes, but she had nothing to do with the stock price rising (all due to BABA's rising value). If someone offered me a shitload of money to run a sinking ship, I would have taken the job, just as she did. With this level of compensation, she's all set for life, does not need another job ever. But, with her connections and name recognition, she will have no trouble finding one - trust me. It is a systemic problem with b…

Well I think back then she was the alternative for turning the company before it sank, but couldn't cut/steer fast enough

Columns from cringely paint a interesting, changing picture over the year http://www.cringely.com/tag/yahoo/page/2/

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

#273

Post by Natsu »

henrikschroder wrote: post #220
existencebox wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a lot of disorganized thoughts on this issue. Please bear with me as I try to gather them together. For the sake of exposition, let's say Mayer makes some $$MM/y, the exact number isn't really important to my point past a certain level, which she most certainly is. What is she being paid that amount for? Let's explore each of the obvious options I see, and an expected common reaction (Had written logical, but…

Marissa was explicitly and publicly hired to turn around the company. She's being paid to take the personal risk of career-ending failure. It's a way for her to hedge the bet she made that she could turn the company around. This goes for all CEOs, the high salary is not compensation for labour, it's a risk premium the shareholders pay to get someone to take the job. For example, in many jurisdictions, the CEO is pers…

That seems more historical than anything. I don't know the last time one of them has gone to jail for much of anything, you're very right about inflation/nepotism, as well.

And I don't really think anything is career-ending for that matter. I mean, look at the mess there was after Carly Fiorina and she's found other things to do.

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

#274

Post by eru »

throwawayyawa wrote: post #123
drzaiusapelord wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>all just running on a treadmill as far as I can tell. Unfortunately, people lose their minds when some company announces layoffs, like some purposeful social harm is being done, yet somehow when a company is having massive hiring no one really questions how much of that is valid or sustainable. People become like you describe; they master the do nothing job via office cult cargoism. It must be exhausting to have a '…

Hi, throwaway with a "fake" job (with quotations because usually 25% of the time I am busy). It is incredibly frustrating to me, because I consider myself a creative and capable individual, who is just fresh off graduation. However, I have a micromanaging, closed-minded rude boss (company lingo: "Leader"), who I prefer to avoid at all costs. At the same time, he seems completely aloof and uninterested in my career go…

If you are smart enough to enjoy reading Hacker News, you might be smart enough to learn programming.

Decent programmers are still very much in demand, no matter what nation-wide crisis you are talking about.

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

#275

Post by eru »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #269
sixQuarks wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't have a business, at least not one that can support the number of employees they have. Their business is actually worth negative dollars. The only thing that was keeping their value high was their Alibaba investment.

If this was true you would be able to purchase Yahoo without AliBaba stocks for $1Billion. However if you walked in with a Billion dollar check and that offer, you will not get a meeting.

What's good for the shareholders and what's good for management are two separate things.

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

#276

Post by thewarrior »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #39
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.

This is one of those things that folks learn over time. I've met masters of the "busy people" who, with no direction whatsoever from above have full meeting schedules, generating reports and presentations and white papers and generally "working hard" but it is all just running on a treadmill as far as I can tell. They are exercising their "execution" habits while waiting for something to actually do. It sort of amaze…

What advice would you give to someone who has a pretty well paying job in an tech company that has over hired ?

On the one hand it's harder to find better jobs as the present job is already kind of nice. On the other hand there's the uncertainty of where everything is going with regards to your long term future at the company and your career.

You can't bring up the fact that the team is bloated because you're basically telling them that you should be fired.

A very awkward position to be in.

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

#277

Post by lazaroclapp »

zipwitch wrote: post #265
tptacek wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, I don't think Mayer makes over 100MM per year, or anything close to that. Second, CEOs get paid lots of money because the market punishes firms that aren't growing and have no-name CEOs, and the cost of a name-brand CEO is probably more than cancelled out by avoiding that penalty. By the time Mayer was recruited, the market consensus was that Yahoo needed a turnaround CEO. There are no cheap turnaround CEOs fo…

There is an inverse correlation between CEO pay and performance. http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2014/06/17/3449737/ceo-pay-...

But, by summing your post and the GP, one can easily hypothesize that the causal relation goes the other way around: sinking companies hire expensive CEOs to try and save themselves. Often that doesn't succeed, because the company was sinking for reasons deeper than poor leadership.

The real question is: do success rates improve for sinking companies that hire a expensive CEO versus those that keep their existing leadership or hire no-name CEOs?

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

#278

Post by junofan »

zipwitch wrote: post #265
tptacek wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, I don't think Mayer makes over 100MM per year, or anything close to that. Second, CEOs get paid lots of money because the market punishes firms that aren't growing and have no-name CEOs, and the cost of a name-brand CEO is probably more than cancelled out by avoiding that penalty. By the time Mayer was recruited, the market consensus was that Yahoo needed a turnaround CEO. There are no cheap turnaround CEOs fo…

There is an inverse correlation between CEO pay and performance. http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2014/06/17/3449737/ceo-pay-...

Is it possible that firms in trouble need to offer higher compensation to attract and retain CEOs?

I skimmed the paper and couldn't find a counter argument, but I didn't understand all the jargon.

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

#279

Post by ec109685 »

1024core wrote: post #75
colmvp wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying it's totally Mayer's fault, but there are numerous stories reported in the media in 2015 where high level execs were basically in limbo in late 2014/early 2015 where she was scurrying to come up with the broad product strategy. This caused so much animosity and frustration, leads opted to leave the company for other positions. So your anecdote doesn't surprise me at all. If leads felt disempowered to m…

> where she was scurrying to come up with the broad product strategy. You don't need a "broad product strategy" to do your job well. Unfortunately, many products coming out of Yahoo are shitty; and this should be fixed regardless of who's on top. Whatever you're working on, make sure it's first-class. Just read this and weep: Jeff Bonforte, Yahoo's SVP for communications products, says: “I just try to ship products t…

That was a quote taken out of context: https://mobile.twitter.com/bonforte/status/67209555273820979...
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