Monday, February 25, 2013

Marissa Mayer is out of her league

Marissa Mayer has a problem. A big problem.

She is out of her league.

I get that Yahoo! has had a lot of problems for quite a long time. But she is going about fixing things in all the wrong ways.

First, she took a two-week maternity leave. While that may be all she needs, she is sending a message to her employees that they better not ask for a lengthy maternity leave. Hopefully no employees have pregnancy complications that require significant time off.

In addition, she doesn't respect anyone's time but her own. It doesn't matter if you are the guy working in the mail room or the CEO. If you can't show up to things on time, it's time to reassess what you are doing. Nobody is going to respect her. It's going to be impossible to get anything done otherwise.

Then she showed off the new homepage on Today, while Yahoo! is a major partner of Good Morning America. Plain and simple, there was a lack of thought to that decision and shows out out of touch Meyer is with what is going on with who the company deals with.

Now, she is not allowing anyone to work remotely. I get that people slack off when they work from home. Guess what? People slack off when they work in the office too. In addition, if people aren't getting work done at home, they aren't being managed properly. Get rid of the problem managers. Don't punish all of those that work remotely because managers don't manage.

While Mayer is making missteps, it is possible she will be able to right the sinking ship that is Yahoo! However, she is showing a trend that shows she is out of touch, disrespectful and not able to make decisions that address the actual problem. She is certainly not someone that I would want to work for, and I am sure there are many people at Yahoo! who are thinking the same.

1 comment:

  1. I agree with what you are saying, but don't you think she is being paid to deliver performance to shareholders and has to do whatever she thinks will result in performance?

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