A Mantle Passed
I just came from an internal all-hands meeting at which Jerry Yang presided as newly minted CEO, and Terry Semel announced his stepping aside to the employees of Yahoo! I can’t discuss the content of the meeting, but I can say that this is a very exciting transition to experience, and I am reminded that it’s not the first such passage I’ve participated in in my career.
When I first joined St. Martin’s Press in 1994, it was as the editorial assistant to a guy named Tom McCormack (whose Wikipedia entry really deserves attention). A quirky, opinionated character, muscular creative judgment, an actor’s command, and a sharp’s ability to cover the angles don’t often arrive in a single package, but when they do, look out. Most everyone I knew either revered Tom or reviled him (and occasionally both), but nobody failed to appreciate him — or the $100+ million publishing house that still ran like a family affair and somehow managed to wring profit out of the unlikeliest books.
Tom was a mentor in the truest sense of the word, alternately encouraging and scolding to the verge of tears younglings of various vintages before me, but ultimately jabbing his cuban cigar at the door and sending them off to beat a sure path to success. I was last off the line (and I’ll keep you posted about the other bit); knowing early on that I would witness an interesting transition if I stuck around long enough, I was not disappointed when Macmillan, the parent company, was sold to the Holtzbrinck conglomerate a few years later.
Ideas clash and things change; hypercompetent individuals rebel at the idea of process; cults of literary personality give way to MBA’s. . . but the main thing is the culture and those charged with its clarity. Either a leader can embrace the tonic change, and the management has the stomach to handle the hangover and convene the new day at the old table, or politicians and bureaucrats prevail. At St. Martin’s, I had a front-row seat, was given a chance, and took my medicine (running a line of travel books, mostly figuring it out as I went). The house’s success after Tom left speaks for itself, a testament to the talent he groomed and the successor he seated firmly at the table’s head — the most abiding of the lessons I was left to ponder on his retirement.
As for Yahoo!, I’m similarly thrilled to be a witness to this changing of the guard. Reorgs have their un-fun parts, but change like this at companies as interesting and important as Yahoo! is right now don’t happen very often. Once again, I’m sitting in a pretty interesting spot.
History — and the shareholders and employees of a $40 billion company — will judge the new CEO with a much harsher lens than Jerry Yang ever put himself under as a Founder or as “Chief Yahoo!”. Yahoo! is in a good position to continue its success, but realizing its true potential depends on whether the new guy “gets it” when it comes to recognizing the issues and the opportunities, has the DNA and the creative vision to know what to do, and has the balls and the stamina and the sheer will to make it happen.
For that job description, I can’t think of a more inspired choice.
