Yahoo says COO De Castro leaving Thursday | Hacker News Reader

Yahoo says COO De Castro leaving Thursday

marketwatch.com

41 pointsleothekim32 comments

The Register hasn't posted its bang-laden made-redundant story yet, but here's their take from when De Castro joined YHOO:

Yahoo! hires! top! Googler! to! revamp! operations! Marissa Mayer gets her man – for a price

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/10/15/yahoo_hires_coo/

"Henrique is an incredibly accomplished and rigorous business leader, and I'm personally excited to have him join Yahoo!'s strong leadership team," said Mayer in a statement. "His operational experience in Internet advertising and his proven success in structuring and scaling global organizations make him the perfect fit for Yahoo! as we propel the business to its next phase of growth."

So! Much! For! All! That!

Stuff like this happens all the time. Tim Cook fired John Browett, who was recruited with great fanfare from a huge retail chain.

One of my first managers confided in me that there were no bad employees, there were just bad fits. And over the years I have really come to appreciate the wisdom of that. I've watched folks who were useless in one environment become superstars in another, and superstars, recruited with much fanfare, who just couldn't get it together when their environment changed. What I haven't found is some magical factor which allows me to predict if someone will do well or not in some environment.

Given the short time between announcement and departure date, I'd be curious to know how that worked. At Sun one of the VP's was told it find a new job and he basically walked out that afternoon and did not return. Other situations have had transition periods. I recognize its a sort of morbid curiosity, wondering if it is something I would do in a similar situation.

I believe it's the curiosity factor that drives interest in these stories, not any intrinsic news value.

It sounds like the knives and "I told you so" peanut gallery are out in force on this one.

Mind elaborating, even if it's wild speculation and rumor? I haven't been following YHOO closely to know the backstory or context behind this individual.

http://recode.net/2014/01/15/henrique-de-castro-out-at-yahoo...

>Considered whip-smart and clever, the former business consultant also made a number of powerful enemies at Google, including top ad product execs Susan Wojcicki and Neal Mohan, among many others.

Looks like the same old carpet baggers... Are there any actual programmers or former programmers occupying high-ranking decision-making positions at these tech companies?!

> Are there any actual programmers or former programmers occupying high-ranking decision-making positions at these tech companies?!

Why would it matter if the leaders had ever programmed before?

They might have the first clue what it is the company does for a start.

You mean advertising?

Marissa was a programmer.

...barely.

Also: http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-coo-henrique-de-castro-...

Hilarious moment in the linked older article when De Castro asked Tim Cook a question at All Things D:

http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-coo-henrique-de-castro-...

(video embedded near the end, question at the 1:34:30 mark.)

>(which may be due to English is not his first language)

Douchiness knows no language barrier. There's a lot of nonverbal communication that conveys compassion - or lack thereof.

>Dos Equis commercials

Doesn't this feel a bit degrading?

Wow. Dictionary definition of "smug" right there.

For a better video experience (I couldn't get the BI video to play for the ATD segment):

http://fixyt.com/watch?v=eUAPHgiEniQ

Again at the 1:34:30 mark

I think there's a huge problem trying to have someone non-technical take charge of a technical task without a proper engineering team behind him. The automatic buying of ads seems like a difficult task.

I don't think a CEO like MM can buy big execs to solve this problem for Yahoo. They need teams of intelligent engineers in addition to experienced execs.

Taking this into account with all the talent acquisitions Yahoo has been doing, it's becoming clear that Yahoo will not be able to create any kind of technical infrastructure. At best, they can hold onto their current revenue model and try to reduce their costs as much as possible.

It's pretty depressing they spent all that money on apps and seemed to go nowhere with any of them.

If you have something hot then what can Yahoo possibly offer you to go and work there, knowing that everything else they touched went nowhere?

All that money on apps?

Yahoo offered this guy $64 million for a 4 year contract. He's leaving after a bit longer than a year, and keeping almost all of it.

Yahoo's problems go deeper than that. Throwing a few million dollars at some acquisitions or talented execs may be a right step, but it is a far cry from fixing the engineering and work culture. That will take sometime, and I hope that the board and MM have the patience.

His task wasn't technical, he was hired as COO (not CTO) and tasked with bringing in ad revenue from big brands for Yahoo. They would presumably hire a people-friendly salesperson to do that.

But the article has quotes about his "difficult personality". He's been called charming but also "kind of an asshole" who was disliked by clients and employees.

It would be fascinating to get an insider view on this.

What does "knives" mean?

I think he's referring to Marissa Mayer skeptics that question whether she's leading an actual turnaround or not.

It's a references to the 'the knives are out'.

http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/the+knives+are+out

Some more information here: http://www.businessinsider.com/after-only-15-months-marissa-...

I have a feeling this guy is going to appear somehow, somewhere in the Portugal Telecom / Oi merger.

You lure advertisers by building great products people want to use (and spend time on). Has Yahoo released anything truly noteworthy since she became CEO?

Their digest and weather app are both rated 4.5 stars in the app store and received very positive reviews. Digest is featured in the app store right now.

These apps are both (presumably) something people use every day.

Maybe. But who exactly is passionate about a weather app?

What's Yahoo? I'll google it.

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