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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 the

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-millions-on-parties-and-sponsorships-says-eric-jackson-2015-12 http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-ceo-marissa-mayer-blows...

Someone1234 11y ago
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.
- tptacek 11y ago
  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 for companies managing 4-5B in annual revenue. Mayer's entire yearly salary is a rounding error compared to the total headcount cost of operating Yahoo, which is widely believed to be both tremendously overstaffed and larded with third-party contractor contracts. Further, ask yourself: what exactly does it accomplish for Mayer to forego a salary in order to keep 1% (check my math, I might be way off) of Yahoo's workforce employed if that workforce isn't doing anything to improve Yahoo's outlook? Yahoo isn't a charity: everything it's employees do ostensibly have to have some hope of providing a return on investment.
  - anotherhacker 11y ago
    The figure is based upon stock options and bonuses. It's here in this picture: http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/566edfb272f2c150028b55be-796-624/screen%20shot%202015-12-14%20at%2010.25.37%20am.png http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/566edfb272f2c150028...
    - tptacek 11y ago
      That's still not close to 100MM/yr and it's contingent, but look, we probably all agree that Yahoo's investors didn't get their money's worth on a marquee CEO. It is, however, weird to me that everyone's so quick to blame Mayer for that. She didn't make up the game. The game stays the game. If it wasn't Mayer presiding over the decline of Yahoo --- probably still after acquiring Tumblr! --- it'd've been someone else.
      - existencebox 11y ago
        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 $$MM/y, the exact number isn't really important to my point past a certain level, which she most certainly is. What is she being paid that amount for? Let's explore each of the obvious options I see, and an expected common reaction (Had written logical, but that's not what I meant, since many common reactions are far from logical). - To restore the company. This clearly did not happen, if this was her job, she failed at it, and for most "normal people", getting paid that $$MM/y seems very off compared to what we might receive in such a failure. - To as you say, preside over the decline. (age gracefully) The argument I'll pose for the anti-Mayer sentiment in this case can be applied more broadly, but is most fitting here. One might expect this sort of role, in parity with firings, would include policies of waist tightening at all levels. I'm not even making a stance for or against these things in this argument, but the press about a slew of very exorbitant and very material benefits when paired beside firing of boots on the ground (again, not taking a stance, just observing the contrasting sentiments) give the _PERCEPTION_ of "let them eat cake", to put it glibly. - To as you say as well earlier, be a face for the markets. If we chose this explanation, realize the "figurehead effect" is a two way street. A famous CEO makes markets look positively on the company (is the thesis) regardless of the company, so if a company is doing badly, should not that emphasis also be on the CEO? It seems disingenuous that the CEO gets the credit for success but not for failure. I'm not saying this is logical, but it is consistent to placing significant value on a figurehead. This last argument is the weakest, given that the markets probably take into account perceived CEO skills as part of "figurehead" status, but the BROADER market (sentiment of the people) likely can't inspect that deeply. So if the financial market loves kingmaking, the people get to see a king, and have their own expectations which do go both ways (in terms of lionizing success c.f. elon musk, and demonizing failure) At the end of the day, each of these universes results in a very negative sentiment towards Mayer, thus my not being as surprised at that outcome.
henrikschroder 11y ago
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)
- anotherhacker 11y ago
  I don't believe that the "best and brightest" consider lavish parties as a deciding factor in where they work. Notice how I phrased it. It's not cost cutting. It's about investing in employees. That is something the "best and the brightest" love.
  - henrikschroder 11y ago
    No, the "best and brightest" at a company are interested in the company investing in them at the expense of the dead weight. They are also not very interested in training, because they don't need it. They want to work on cutting-edge projects. "Training" is something that the poor performers are going to flock to, because it benefits them. Which is the polar opposite of what the top performers want.
    - 0uasidjkas 11y ago
      I don't think it's fair to say that it's the polar opposite of what they want, or to imply that all top performers feel the same way. Even the most talented junior developers could use some training, and if done properly it saves me time doing ad-hoc training/mentoring. A company's willingness to invest in its employees via training in particular is a positive indicator for me. Obviously this doesn't apply to early-stage startups and such.
discardorama 11y ago
I was at Yahoo when Carol Bartz came in and did exactly that. And guess what? Morale plummeted. "The beatings will continue until the morale improves" .... ever heard of that?
- eplanit 11y ago
  She had the same effect at Autodesk by applying the same philosophy.
- anotherhacker 11y ago
  Do you have a reference to that? I can't find any evidence that Carlo Bartz engaged in any retraining of employees. Again, I'm not suggesting cost cutting. I'm suggesting a move from frivolous expenses, to those which help make the employees more successful. As I commented before, Deming was all about training employees over firing them. https://www.deming.org/theman/theories/fourteenpoints https://www.deming.org/theman/theories/fourteenpoints
  - henrikschroder 11y ago
    Perks in SV companies are absolutely not frivolous expenses! They are a necessary expense to attract and keep the right talent, in competition with other SV companies that also offer generous perks. If you cut it, morale plummets and you will lose a lot of good employees. The link you posted contains great tips for assembly-line factories filled with replaceable hourly workers. SV is.. not that.
  - discardorama 11y ago
    I was there when she cancelled the year-end party.
mattlutze 11y ago
Culture and momentum are real and important parts of workforce morale. Killing them off, will actually send the wrong message to employees. I've been at companies who followed the above and ended first an annual 4th of July party, then scaled back the Christmas holiday party, then started cutting semi-regular, informal, socialization activities over lunches and what not. There was nothing more damaging to morale at that firm than killing the few times a year we got to have a bit of fun on the company's dime. We worked hard so the CEO could buy another house, and the reward was "no bonuses, no parties this year." I watched the life drain out of that place. Killing employee morale activities costing millions won't save jobs lost by spending billions or implementing anti-employee policies.

Someone1234 11y ago

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.

tptacek 11y ago
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 for companies managing 4-5B in annual revenue. Mayer's entire yearly salary is a rounding error compared to the total headcount cost of operating Yahoo, which is widely believed to be both tremendously overstaffed and larded with third-party contractor contracts. Further, ask yourself: what exactly does it accomplish for Mayer to forego a salary in order to keep 1% (check my math, I might be way off) of Yahoo's workforce employed if that workforce isn't doing anything to improve Yahoo's outlook? Yahoo isn't a charity: everything it's employees do ostensibly have to have some hope of providing a return on investment.
- anotherhacker 11y ago
  The figure is based upon stock options and bonuses. It's here in this picture: http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/566edfb272f2c150028b55be-796-624/screen%20shot%202015-12-14%20at%2010.25.37%20am.png http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/566edfb272f2c150028...
  - tptacek 11y ago
    That's still not close to 100MM/yr and it's contingent, but look, we probably all agree that Yahoo's investors didn't get their money's worth on a marquee CEO. It is, however, weird to me that everyone's so quick to blame Mayer for that. She didn't make up the game. The game stays the game. If it wasn't Mayer presiding over the decline of Yahoo --- probably still after acquiring Tumblr! --- it'd've been someone else.
    - existencebox 11y ago
      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 $$MM/y, the exact number isn't really important to my point past a certain level, which she most certainly is. What is she being paid that amount for? Let's explore each of the obvious options I see, and an expected common reaction (Had written logical, but that's not what I meant, since many common reactions are far from logical). - To restore the company. This clearly did not happen, if this was her job, she failed at it, and for most "normal people", getting paid that $$MM/y seems very off compared to what we might receive in such a failure. - To as you say, preside over the decline. (age gracefully) The argument I'll pose for the anti-Mayer sentiment in this case can be applied more broadly, but is most fitting here. One might expect this sort of role, in parity with firings, would include policies of waist tightening at all levels. I'm not even making a stance for or against these things in this argument, but the press about a slew of very exorbitant and very material benefits when paired beside firing of boots on the ground (again, not taking a stance, just observing the contrasting sentiments) give the _PERCEPTION_ of "let them eat cake", to put it glibly. - To as you say as well earlier, be a face for the markets. If we chose this explanation, realize the "figurehead effect" is a two way street. A famous CEO makes markets look positively on the company (is the thesis) regardless of the company, so if a company is doing badly, should not that emphasis also be on the CEO? It seems disingenuous that the CEO gets the credit for success but not for failure. I'm not saying this is logical, but it is consistent to placing significant value on a figurehead. This last argument is the weakest, given that the markets probably take into account perceived CEO skills as part of "figurehead" status, but the BROADER market (sentiment of the people) likely can't inspect that deeply. So if the financial market loves kingmaking, the people get to see a king, and have their own expectations which do go both ways (in terms of lionizing success c.f. elon musk, and demonizing failure) At the end of the day, each of these universes results in a very negative sentiment towards Mayer, thus my not being as surprised at that outcome.

henrikschroder 11y ago

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)

anotherhacker 11y ago
I don't believe that the "best and brightest" consider lavish parties as a deciding factor in where they work. Notice how I phrased it. It's not cost cutting. It's about investing in employees. That is something the "best and the brightest" love.
- henrikschroder 11y ago
  No, the "best and brightest" at a company are interested in the company investing in them at the expense of the dead weight. They are also not very interested in training, because they don't need it. They want to work on cutting-edge projects. "Training" is something that the poor performers are going to flock to, because it benefits them. Which is the polar opposite of what the top performers want.
  - 0uasidjkas 11y ago
    I don't think it's fair to say that it's the polar opposite of what they want, or to imply that all top performers feel the same way. Even the most talented junior developers could use some training, and if done properly it saves me time doing ad-hoc training/mentoring. A company's willingness to invest in its employees via training in particular is a positive indicator for me. Obviously this doesn't apply to early-stage startups and such.

discardorama 11y ago

I was at Yahoo when Carol Bartz came in and did exactly that. And guess what? Morale plummeted. "The beatings will continue until the morale improves" .... ever heard of that?

eplanit 11y ago
She had the same effect at Autodesk by applying the same philosophy.
anotherhacker 11y ago
Do you have a reference to that? I can't find any evidence that Carlo Bartz engaged in any retraining of employees. Again, I'm not suggesting cost cutting. I'm suggesting a move from frivolous expenses, to those which help make the employees more successful. As I commented before, Deming was all about training employees over firing them. https://www.deming.org/theman/theories/fourteenpoints https://www.deming.org/theman/theories/fourteenpoints
- henrikschroder 11y ago
  Perks in SV companies are absolutely not frivolous expenses! They are a necessary expense to attract and keep the right talent, in competition with other SV companies that also offer generous perks. If you cut it, morale plummets and you will lose a lot of good employees. The link you posted contains great tips for assembly-line factories filled with replaceable hourly workers. SV is.. not that.
- discardorama 11y ago
  I was there when she cancelled the year-end party.

mattlutze 11y ago

Culture and momentum are real and important parts of workforce morale. Killing them off, will actually send the wrong message to employees. I've been at companies who followed the above and ended first an annual 4th of July party, then scaled back the Christmas holiday party, then started cutting semi-regular, informal, socialization activities over lunches and what not. There was nothing more damaging to morale at that firm than killing the few times a year we got to have a bit of fun on the company's dime. We worked hard so the CEO could buy another house, and the reward was "no bonuses, no parties this year." I watched the life drain out of that place. Killing employee morale activities costing millions won't save jobs lost by spending billions or implementing anti-employee policies.