Marissa Mayer's actions since becoming CEO remind me a lot of Steve Jobs' after returning to Apple -
First, get rid of the stragglers and people who don't believe in your vision. MM did this by ending remote work at Yahoo, and Steve Jobs did it by gathering everyone up and telling anyone who wasn't on board to "get the hell out" [1]. This will get rid of all the unmotivated and/or pessimistic people who might hold the company back.
Next, focus heavily on rebranding and spend a crapload of cash to convince the public that your company is different now. Steve Jobs did this with his famous "Think Different" ads [2], and Marissa Mayer seems to be doing this by making big PR waves with big acquisitions of mobile-centric startups. Hopefully this will make your company "cool" again and make the "A players" actually want to work for you (again).
And then of course, build a bunch of awesome products and then TAKE OVER THE WORLD as Apple did. We'll see if Yahoo can do the same.
"Anyway, so Steve said 'You know what, we're going to build a great company. We're going to reinvent the world. And anybody who believes me, like let's get moving. If you don't believe that will happen then get the hell out."
First, get rid of the stragglers and people who don't believe in your vision. MM did this by ending remote work at Yahoo, and Steve Jobs did it by gathering everyone up and telling anyone who wasn't on board to "get the hell out" [1]. This will get rid of all the unmotivated and/or pessimistic people who might hold the company back.
Next, focus heavily on rebranding and spend a crapload of cash to convince the public that your company is different now. Steve Jobs did this with his famous "Think Different" ads [2], and Marissa Mayer seems to be doing this by making big PR waves with big acquisitions of mobile-centric startups. Hopefully this will make your company "cool" again and make the "A players" actually want to work for you (again).
And then of course, build a bunch of awesome products and then TAKE OVER THE WORLD as Apple did. We'll see if Yahoo can do the same.
[1] http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=3067
"Anyway, so Steve said 'You know what, we're going to build a great company. We're going to reinvent the world. And anybody who believes me, like let's get moving. If you don't believe that will happen then get the hell out."
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_Different