Let's be honest. It's been over for a while. We forecast its impending death all the time. The company may not be "officially" dead, but it's truly as good as gone now that it's been revealed that CEO Scott Thompson "misrepresented" his education on his résumé. His bio and résumé have indicated that he received a computer science degree from Stonehill College when, in fact, he didn't. Haha! This "error" was revealed by board member Daniel Loeb, who -- as Kim Davis recently wrote -- has appeared to be planning Thompson's "bloodless assassination."
While Yahoo tried to cast this off as an "inadvertent mistake," that excuse doesn't really fly since Thompson was also fibbing about his education on his résumé when he was CTO of PayPal.
Scott Thompson's degree at Stonehill College was in bachelor science in accounting. There was an inadvertent error that stated Mr. Thompson also holds a degree in computer science. This, in no way, alters that fact that Mr. Thompson is a highly qualified executive with a successful track record leading large consumer technology companies. Under Mr. Thompson's leadership, Yahoo! is moving forward to grow the company and drive shareholder value.
Well, Yahoo has one thing correct here: Scott Thompson's degree is BS.
Beyond that, this situation is mortifying, and the above statement by Yahoo makes it worse. Its approach to handling this has only armed onlookers (read: everyone) with a heavier load of stones to throw.
And because of that, it's time we release a statement of our own: Yahoo's obituary. Because as far as we're concerned, this company's life is officially over. Likely Yahoo will fire Thompson and try to carry on for a bit, but there's no life left there, and it's only a matter of time before it's all over. So we say why wait for the inevitable? Let us mourn now.
Yahoo, 1994 to 2012: Yahoo was founded in 1994 by David Filo and Jerry Yang who were Stanford PhD students (we think).
Its two most recent executives prior to its death were Carol Bartz, whose leadership was marked by several droppings of the F-bomb, and Scott Thompson, who BS-ed his way to the top (and then straight to the bottom).
Before doing everything possible to ensure failure, Yahoo enjoyed some success as a search portal with other services, like email and stuff.
Toward the end of its life, Yahoo witnessed a rapid fall from grace, turning down a $45 billion-dollar offer to be revived by Microsoft. Just prior to its passing, Yahoo began to show signs of senility, waking up some days thinking it was a startup. (Sigh.)
Yahoo, now so totally dead, is survived by Google and Facebook, and even AOL, which is especially pathetic.
Please feel free to weigh in on the message boards with your memories and sentiments for the dearly and depressingly departed-to-be.
Great link to the New Yorker piece on Loeb, Rufus. I love this sentence from that: "To some degree, [Loeb's] manner is that of the traditional Wall Street crank: swagger and self-interest disguised as moralistic bombast."
That said, two wrongs don't make a right. (I seem to keep writing that phrase over and over today on these boards.) While I can't argue with you about Loeb's conduct,
The issue that give me pause with regard to Thompson is that the SEC documents about him state his background accurately -- ie he only has an accounting degree. His resume is false, period. To me, that raises a red flag about his day-to-day honesty. Yes, arguments could be made about how salespeople always exaggerate, how executives must sell themselves, etc. But one's resume? That's not the place to inadvertently misstate anything.
@RufusJones: I agree with your points about the degree. I think this issue should be a kick-off for a larger discussion about what's necessary and what's not, degree-wise, when going into IT leadership roles.
The fact that he lied about it is the sticky part. If it doesn't matter, like we're suggesting, why include it in a resume?
As for the board, you're right that firing another CEO will look very bad, and I fully expect them to do so, which is why I think this is really the end for Yahoo.
I'm surprised too, lin, that it took this long to uncover this "inadvertent error."
I wonder, had he not used the "BS" degree when going to Yahoo, if this still would've come out. It seems Loeb is hell-bent on getting this guy out. Maybe it would've been exposed that the only reason he has gotten to where he is so far is that he lied originally about having a degree in computer science. Who knows. Anyway, it's a mess, and it's still unfolding.
I'd agree with a large percentage of this, but for one thing: Had Thompson done what you propose, Dickless (the hedge fund manager who wants to gut the company; h/t to Ghostbusters for the use of the term) would have used the removal as his jawbone.
My complaint about the coverage of this affair has been that all of the attention has been focused on Thompson, and none on Loeb. He is doing this because he wants four people-- hismelf, Jeff Zucker, Mike Wolf and Harry Wilson-- named to the board. He would not care one whit about Thompson's background if he could get those spots.
It's common, when a public figure is charged in a sex scandal, for every media outlet in the world to zero in on the accuser's past, speculating on what motives she might have had and whether she had ever done anything that might cast doubt on her motives for briginign the charge.
Here we have a situation where a very rich guy with a history of being a jerk is involved, and everyone is acting like he's Joan of Arc.
@Nicole, the odds are that the board woin't ignore the kerfluffle, because it's been doing self-destructive things for years. The worst thing it could do is fire another CEO and go through the hunt again... so that's probably what it will do.
It's clear that the jackass who started this won't quit, because he doesn't care about the issue at all. He's trying to get seats on the board. If Scott Thompson had a 20-year old DUI, he'd be waving that around.
My take on this is reaslity-based. I would like someone to explain to me how a degree in computer science obtainsed in 1979-- which would have been completed two years before the introduction of the IBM PC in 1981-- would be of any earthly use to Yahoo.
Again from the RBP: An accounting degree would seem to be vastly more useful for a CEO than a degree in computer science (though less useful than a double major).
One last thought: If Yahoo hired Thompson based on his degree, rather than his work at Coopers and Lybrand, Visa, Barclay's and PayPal, they are idiots.
I don't fault Scott Thompson for lack of honor or character failings. I would not dream of asking these these things from a CEO. However, I do expect a CEO to be savvy and have impeccable risk management skills. This is where I have a problem – I take issue with Scott Thompson for his poor risk management skills, demonstrated by his failure to remove a bogus degree from his resume. After a stint as the CEO of PayPal, did he think people would think less of him because he had an undergraduate degree in accounting?
If the choice is between not being able to interview for your perfect job and making a small typo on a resume, then the typo is an acceptable risk – much like opening up a firewall for a specific process. To leave the typo in the resume, or to leave the opening in the firewall, when they are no longer needed is an unacceptable risk.
I'm surprised that in the age of the waybackmachine and information that never dies on the Internet, this inadvertent mistake remained undiscovered for so long.
Well, now I am afraid to place bets. However, the board will be under pressure, I think. I am not so sure that Thompson is popular with employees, either. And the board itself has been losing face for awhile.
True Nicole - but I think they missed the boat with getting enough new minds on board. And the old memories of Yahoo-likers seems faded and somewhat stale.
A shame, it would have been nice to see a newly revised that was really new and revised.
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