Valleyspeak translated: Marissa Mayer herds pumas
Google's most public VP occasionally slips beyond even the most creative interpreter's grasp. But in Marissa Mayer's latest interview in BusinessWeek, her message is clear — once it's translated from Valleyspeak.
For instance, she says about the Google Checkout payment system:
PayPal is a really excellent, mature product. And our service, if you actually look at what we are doing, doesn't really take aim at what they do and what their core competencies are. So there is just a misunderstanding of where the product is aimed.
She means: "Still, it's fun to watch 'em squirm."
Marissa speaks volumes, after the jump.
She says:
Gmail, I would say, has actually been phenomenally popular. It may not be the size of Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail. We actually have artificially restricted the uptake [...] if we removed the invitation model, we would see ten times as much demand. And if you do that calculation, we would be almost as large as Yahoo! or Hotmail. So, we think that Gmail is actually a very good product.
She means: "Pay no attention to the ComScore report, pay no attention to the ComScore report..."
She says:
[CEO] Eric [Schmidt] and [co-founder] Larry [Page] acknowledged that we really do need to apply a little bit more organization to some of what's happening here at Google.
She means: "Dad took the car keys and grounded me. Can't party, must do homework."
Mayer says:
There certainly are some engineers who tire of working on one particular task and want to move on to a new task.
Mayer means: "You've heard of Geek A.D.D.? Add that to a PhD and a sense of entitlement, and 'herding cats' becomes a woefully inadequate metaphor. Try 'herding ecstasy-fed pumas.'"
BusinessWeek asks, "Do product managers need to have more power inside Google?" Mayer says:
No, I don't think so.
She means: "I'm the VP of search products. You seriously think I'd let them have my power?"
