Jerry Mandering - End Of A Yahoo Era

Its finally over.  Jerry Yang has stepped down as Yahoo's CEO. 

I feel bad for him.  Everyone else has savaged him mercilessly... while I can see that through all the tough times, he still talked about "bleeding purple", and did his best to shield his employees from harm, including laying off a smaller number than should have been appropriate.

Which of course points out that he wasn't a good CEO - a good CEO of a company as big and as troubled as Yahoo would need to make merciless, dispassionate decisions.  But in these tough economic times, saving some jobs (even if its only temporary) has to be looked at favorably.

Anyway, I want to nominate someone for the now vacant CEO post, someone who I believe has what it takes to take Yahoo to the next level....

Signs of a Downturn - Yahoo cutting 3.5K Jobs

Per a Valleywag tipster, Yahoo is about to cut 3.5K jobs in early December.  The job cuts have long been rumored, but the number sounds higher than earlier guesses. 

What seems a bad move - the layoffs are going to be announced within a week of an over-the-top holiday party.  And, of course, there are rumors that the severance packages will be pathetic.

Not I'm normally ok with holiday parties - layoffs are exactly when you need to put something else up to boost up the morale of remaining employees.  LifeScan, a Johnson & Johnson company, did this while I was there, after their first layoff in almost a decade.  But the timing isn't good.   And, of course, if severance packages are bad, this reflects poorly indeed on the judgement of the executive team.

Most of the layoffs are rumored to be in Finance and Sales/ GA.

Yahooooooooo

Signs of a Downturn - eBay, Yahoo layoffs coming?

A former eBay employee is a friend, and is reporting potential layoffs.  This is completely unsubstantiated so far, but it would make sense - eBay has been losing its clout, and its business model changes haven't been received too well this year.  They also probably have more people than they need, from what I've seen - even to just keep operations going as-is.

And Yahoo might slash up to another 3,500 positions in Q4.  The funny thing is, with the huge number of defections from Yahoo each month, the true effect is much deeper than the layoffs indicate. 

Signs of a downturn indeed.