I was at Yahoo briefly (8 months, never again !) and middle management at Yahoo was absolutely the problem. A single SVP had 20 VPs and around a 100 Directors and Senior directors most of whom were lifers and 'career bureaucrats'. Less than 1% would be employable at another tech company.
The status quo at Yahoo before Marissa suits them just fine and they will always find ways to twist any effort from the top to their benefit.
QPRs are a classic example. It was intended to weed out under performers, but as the parent comment pointed out, the middle managers were the under performers. So they just made QPR evaluations into a secret, subjective process which they then used as a club to beat engineers who dared oppose them. Worked out pretty well for them, not so well for Yahoo. Anyone who was worth a damn found a new job pretty quickly.
I was at Yahoo briefly (8 months, never again !) and middle management at Yahoo was absolutely the problem. A single SVP had 20 VPs and around a 100 Directors and Senior directors most of whom were lifers and 'career bureaucrats'. Less than 1% would be employable at another tech company.
The status quo at Yahoo before Marissa suits them just fine and they will always find ways to twist any effort from the top to their benefit.
QPRs are a classic example. It was intended to weed out under performers, but as the parent comment pointed out, the middle managers were the under performers. So they just made QPR evaluations into a secret, subjective process which they then used as a club to beat engineers who dared oppose them. Worked out pretty well for them, not so well for Yahoo. Anyone who was worth a damn found a new job pretty quickly.