While it was predicted that Yahoo would have a layoff this month and yesterday I wrote Yahoo expects at least 1000 layoffs today (which happened.. exactly as I wrote it) the bigger story is not so much the layoffs, which after all were expected, but Jerry Yang's leadership, according to Adotas. Jerry Yang has not turned out to be the same kind of "turn around leader/founder" as Steve Jobs has been for Apple.
"…Many industry insiders have been questioning the effectiveness of Yang and if he’s really the guy to get the job done at Yahoo. This is the eighth straight quarter Yahoo has experienced slowing profits and the three years of declining sales rates.
Since Yang came back on board at Yahoo, they have acquired Right Media, Blue Lithium and invested heavily into the world of mobile, and yet, executives have dropped like flies. Mr. Yang does not by nature come across as an extremely confident leader, but does have the years of experience that even the Google team would envy. At the Right Media Open conference in back in October Yang stated that “I do not see Yahoo as a troubled company, if you step outside of Silicon Valley and evaluate the impact of Yahoo it’s very successful and performing well.”
My sense the Internet environment has changed so much since the mid 90's that just being a founder does not translate to reviving a company. I think someone who exudes confidence and vision is clearly felt by the onlookers - it's hard to lead a company up, out of a slump without really having it - founder or not.
