Yahoo!’s Marissa Mayer is a machine. She’s doing damned good things with the company—hired in 2010, and publicly announced on that same day she was pregnant, due in September. At the time, Yahoo!’s stock was languishing around $15.
As a top Lieutenant at google (she was employee #20), Mayer was asked about her stupidly grueling schedule (about 250 all-nighters while there). She responded, “I don’t really believe in burnout.” Hell, I guess not.
Since joining Yahoo! just two short years ago, Mayer got rid of the BlackBerrys, replacing them with iPhones and Androids. She provides employees with free food, like all other Silicon Valley companies. She created a system for employees to complain about bureaucracy. She implemented Friday-afternoon meetings (called F.Y.I.’s) where employees can ask Mayer and other execs anything they want. She acquired tumblr, and made nearly $7B in an Alibaba stock sale.
In other words, she turned around a large, bureaucratic, flailing company. The Guardian,a UK based news magazine, says this about Mayer: “Newsflash: move over Gordon Gekko, women can be fat cat capitalist bastards too.”
And did I mention she’s more than doubled Yahoo!’s stock price?
And did I mention she’s again pregnant—this time with identical twins?
She’s a machine, and worthy of our Leadership Leader.
That’s right. The King CEO launched a website, issues a press release, and even had mock-ups done to contain the allegedly peace-building McWhopper… all before contacting Mickey D’s CEO Easterbrook to chat. Burger King (a division of Canadian Tim Horton’s), slipping to #3 burger joint recently, had nothing to lose and everything to gain. But manipulative crap like that doesn’t usually sit well, and this (surprisingly) did not.
Nice try, BK. Really. I’ve got this really cool, alternative idea. Given your lackluster performance as an enterprise, the likelihood your P.E. owner will expect a real return, and McDonald’s seven straight losing quarters… how about you guys both just concentrate on building mediocre burgers and call it a day?
Sometimes, mediocrity is a function of bad decision-making. Like this.
“Life is Short. Have an Affair.” This is the Ashley Madison website slogan. The website, recently hacked and had its subscriber base made public, makes its money selling the chance of an affair to men. I say “men,” since they are the only ones who pay to use the website.
So, this paragon of ethics is having a bit of a struggle; seems when married people subscribe to a website for cheaters, they want some degree of confidentiality. Whouldathunkit??
Never mind all the really easy name-calling and labels. The best part is that the CEO (actually parent company CEO), Noel Biderman, recently “stepped down” in “the best interest of the company.” Biderman, hailed as both “the most hated man on the internet” and “the King of Infidelity” apparently was taking advantage of the services himself, much to the surprise of many (presumably, even his wife). Having pick of the litter, he connected—and had affairs—with multiple “subscribers.”
There’s an executive perk you don’t see every day.
From a business perspective (though the scurrilous stuff is much more fun), this was a company on a meteoric path, doing less than $30M in 2009 and almost $115M last year. It had its sights on a European-based IPO soon, hoping to raise $200M on a $1B valuation.
Leadership is inherently fraught with risks; we can no more avoid them than we can the decisions that cause the concerns. Wringing our hands won’t fix it, neither will running around the figurative circle waving our arms about.
Trust me, it’s been tried. And it ain’t all that pretty…
Any way you cut it, there’s risk in leadership. (more…)
I was recently asked that question by a client. Now, in all fairness, I didn’t actually say it was a stupid question.
But it is. Of course they work.
The premise of the question is the problem. Of course Balanced Scorecards “work.” They display a particular set of organization-specific metrics to use within the context of coaching and performance management/improvement. They don’t do–nor are they supposed to do–any more than that.
Therein lies the problem, and the basis for my “stupid” comment. Too many think that scorecards, incentive plans, spiffs, et al, should actually DO something. Like somehow substitute for leadership. Like motivate so a leader doesn’t have to. Like provide the impetus for discretionary effort and productivity without any leadership heavy-lifting.
Balanced Scorecards work just fine. Incentives (if done properly) work just fine.
When you watch baseball, what do you expect the scorecard to do? Make hits? Score runs? Catch balls? It’s a scorecard–it tracks your score.
When you play golf, what do you expect the scorecard to do? Hit drives? Make putts? Whistle at the cart girl? It’s a scorecard–it tracks your score.
If related leadership would just remove their heads from their collective butts, maybe the added benefit of those scorecards could be realized. Brazen Leaders don’t have their heads up their butts. That’s practically a definition.
In discussing leadership styles and philosophies… with clients, potential clients, friends, over-the-fence neighbors, owners and executives, one of the most frequent refrains is “Well, I try to lead by example.”
Well hoorah for you. I think that’s just great. News flash, Dick Tracy, you don’t have a choice.
That’s right, no choice whatsoever. You see, when you show up—for work, for a drink with fellow employees, at a ball-game where employees are present, or even bump into one of those employees while being photographed for “People of Wal-Mart,”—you are an example.
The very fact you show up means you’re on stage, setting an example for others to emulate.
The only choice you have in all of that, is whether to be a good example or a crappy example.
Be on time, for everything: Positive Example
Use profanity in a meeting: Crappy Example
Ask about their family and weekend: Positive Example
Breeze through hallways without a word: Crappy Example
See, these things aren’t rocket surgery. This simply is not complex stuff; people glean behavior cues, way of being, how to act and what to say, from leadership examples.
I was at the Master’s golf championship in Augusta, Georgia a few years ago. Now many of you know this, but the people who run Augusta National (the Club) are fanatic about their rules. Positively loony about 100% enforcement, all the time, no matter what. So, we were in line to get in, early one morning, for a practice round. One of the rules is “no hard-seated chairs.” You can carry in a wide variety of seats, camping chairs, lawn chairs, etc., provided they have soft seats. The reason, of course, is that they don’t want you later standing on those seats, blocking the pristine Augusta views from others.
Well, you knew it would happen… just in front of us was a group of 3 guys. They saw the signs, discussed it quietly amongst themselves, then decided they’d give it a shot — that they wouldn’t get caught.
Wrong — cold-busted.
The gate marshal came up to the guy carrying the chair, and stated flatly, “that can’t come inside the grounds.” To which this 40-something adult male responded, “Well, why can HE do it, then???” …all the while pointing to another gentleman’s chair about 15 feet in front. That’s right — his complete rationale for doing what he knew to be wrong was, “someone else is doing it, and you haven’t said anything to him.”
Don’t kid yourself; this is not near as much an anomaly as we would like to believe. The behavior we allow, we promote. No different than if we were modeling the behavior ourselves. Think about that when you feel like it’s just too much trouble to correct some seemingly isolated (but negative) behavior in your staff.
Exemplify positive leadership–always. Or find a different profession. We need leaders who understand their influence on others.
Like it or not, you—and your position of executive leadership—are under a microscope 24×7.
You are always the example; those in your charge will certainly emulate your actions, behavior, maybe even your way of thinking. The question becomes, of course, are you a good example or… “not so much?”
You might be thinking, particularly if you hold a senior-most role, that the people working for you are already “set in their ways;” they don’t really change for anyone, anyway…; or even, “Hell, they’re old! They don’t need me for an example!”
Don’t believe that crap for one second. They look to you for the right–and wrong–way to do things. Be the right example. All the time. If not, get prepared — it’ll spread like wildfire, and you are personally responsible.
Jamie Dimon isn’t a hero. He hasn’t braved battles for lives—life and death—that warriors have. He has not had to defend a beach head or hill or piece of dirt against some unknown enemy.
He’s just a businessman. But he’s damned good at it. The singular point of light during the financial crisis in 2008-2009 (the only bank not needing TARP funds), Dimon has led JPMorgan Chase through some incredible times. He even bailed out Bear Stearns and scooped up Washington Mutual when they all but died—saving some 30,000 jobs in the process. (more…)
Therein lies the problem, and the basis for my “stupid” comment. Too many think that scorecards, incentive plans, spiffs, et al, should actually DO something. Like somehow substitute for leadership. Like motivate so a leader doesn’t have to. Like provide the impetus for discretionary effort and productivity without any leadership heavy-lifting.
