One of the biggest complaints of the public equity markets is the incredibly short-term focus of participants. Management teams for publicly traded entities face severe consequences from a market short on patience.

Decisions tend to be focused on delivering short-term results. The "beat the number" game has become standard operating procedure. Such is the cost of accessing capital while providing shareholders liquidity.

But is worth it? I'm not so sure.

Investors want the company to make as much money as possible in the short term. As a result, if a company is not profitable in a given quarter, there is extreme pressure to cut costs and to do so immediately -- no matter the longer-term expense of such action.

In many cases cutting costs are exactly the right tonic to rejuvenate profits, but in some instances, those short-term cuts can do more damage than good.

This past week, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) dropped a big bomb on the market by releasing its quarterly earnings earlier than expected. Lost in the headline of the lower revenue and earnings number was the announcement that the company would be cutting 5,000 jobs from its rolls.

For the first time in its history, MSFT is laying off employees. My question is, why bother?

Continue reading What the heck was Microsoft thinking?

What the heck was Microsoft thinking? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 23 Jan 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.