Jerry Yang fires 10% of workforce in lowercase email

Posted Oct 21st 2008 7:10PM by Sarah Gilbert
Filed under: Earnings Reports, Bad News, Yahoo! (YHOO), Employees

I once worked for an ex-Yahoo! employee, and he conducted most of his business in lower-case. That's not, however, how he laid people off. In an email to the whole company today after Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) reported earnings were down 64%, CEO Jerry Yang announced he would be laying off 10% of the workforce "in the next several weeks." Net income reported was $54 million for the third quarter of 2008, compared to $151 million in the third quarter of 2007, with revenue of $1.325 billion. The company met expectations of nine cents per share.

"we understand that hearing this news now creates uncertainty, but we are moving ahead in a way that balances speed with a clear focus on accomplishing what is necessary to set the organization up for long term success," Yang wrote. At the rate the company has made change over the last few years, I hardly expect brilliant things. Long-term success? Investors would probably settle for "not making pathologically boneheaded mistakes that cost the company 70% of its stock price" at this point.

Tags: inthenews, jerry yang, JerryYang, layoffs, yahoo, yang, yhoo

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

10-22-2008 @ 10:28AM

George Bowser said...

I would still buy Yahoo. They have a good product with NO debt.

10-21-2008 @ 9:37PM

microhoo said...

WOW!!! Yang you SHOULD be fired....... There would be NO layoffs IF you would have taken the buyout from Microsoft. You SHOULD resign. What the hell kind of leader are you???? You should be exhiled back to CHINA..........

10-22-2008 @ 8:58AM

scott said...

It sucks, but it Yang's company. If those 1500 people found better jobs, they would walk away from the company tomorrow and noone would care.

10-22-2008 @ 9:00AM

John Mader said...

Yang should commit public suicide with a sharp knife across the belly. But that would be the honorable thing and Yang is Chinese and not Japanese. Honor does not seem to be a Chinese trait. Arrogance, yes, honor, no.