Monday, November 20, 2006

Wow! I wish I worked for Yahoo!

While scanning my usual list of marketing blogs, I came across an article about a leaked internal office memo from Yahoo! leadership (Senior Vice President Brad Garlinghouse). The memo is directed to all employees. It discusses the situation of the company and expresses a vision for the company's growth and impending changes.

Why is this important you ask?

Well, we all know that people do not like change and that worse than that, they do not like losing their jobs. This memo specifically says that they need to get lean and mean and tells the employees that they will be trimming the workforce but also how they will be doing it. This is great! The workforce has a roadmap for the company growth. They also know that the company values hardwork and grit. If they want to keep their job and not be part of the trimmed force, then they better get off their ends and start working.

This type of communication puts a charge into a workforce and gives those that work hard already, a sense of being and the confidence in their leadership.

I love this.

It reminds me of my time in the U.S. Navy. We always had a focused mission and our officers, for the most part, did a great job of putting a positive charge of energy into us. We knew what we were doing, why we were doing it, and felt good about our results.

Good job, Brad.

Thank you for having the courage and the vision to communicate this important strategic message to your workforce. Let's just hope that those that work for you recognize it for what it is and not sit around and complain.

If you work for Yahoo!, get on the bandwagon and help make Yahoo! an even better place to work and help strengthen your position. At least you have someone giving it to you straight and telling you how much he loves and enjoys working for Yahoo! and that he wants you to join him in getting the company back into the great company category and not settling for just being a good company.

You could have someone else. You could have some guy who is sitting around buying gold plated shower curtains and wasting away his leadership potential. This guy wants to get to work but needs your help.

By the way, I do not work for Yahoo! and don't even know anyone that does but I am fired up about this memo.