Yahoo's "decision-makers" can't decide who to ax. The New York Times reports that a final plan and "perhaps a few alternative plans" could soon be submitted to the board. Maybe at its scheduled January 29 meeting. Maybe not. But don't be scared by all the uncertainty, little Yahoos. Valleywag wants the people, not Yahoo's board, to decide who should get the boot.
Yahoo has issued a nonstatement on pending layoffs: "Yahoo has embarked on a multi-year transformation that includes making tough decisions about the business to help the company grow" and that the company "plans to invest in some areas, reduce emphasis in others and eliminate some areas of the business that don't support the company's priorities." A source says that the layoffs will number around 500 — fewer than expected. [San Francisco Chronicle]
Rumors abound that Yahoo is set to cut 1,500 to 2,000 employees, under a plan being weighed by CEO Jerry Yang. Sadly, layoffs now only seem logical: Yahoo is doing too much, to too little effect. Extraneous projects are staffed by personnel who should be doing more productive work, or none at all. Cruel? It's capitalism — a notion Yahoo has struggled with since its birth. But it's also not a solution to Yahoo's problems. Simple math shows why.
Tesla Motors founder Martin Eberhard, who was ousted from the company a month ago, lists the names and titles of 26 Tesla employees he claims have been fired following the installation of new management. The turnover came after the company missed its deadline to ship its first batch of 100 electric sports cars. Tesla's new management has attributed the delay to problems with the car's unique transmission. Asks Eberhard, "Is this really the right time for Tesla to be tightening its belt? Get the transmission working and ship the cars. No show stoppers here!" Tesla's VP of marketing, Darryl Siry, is a regular commenter at Jalopnik and Valleywag. Darryl, any comment? VentureBeat has more reporting.
You wondered what qualifications Garry Steckles, a St. Kitts restauranteur, brings to his job as a consultant for the Chicago Sun-Times, which is facing imminent layoffs. Apart from being childhood friend of the Chicago newspaper's editor-in-chief, "I worked [at English newspaper Shields Gazette] from 1960 to 1964, on the sports desk... full time, straight out of school, at 30 bob a week," he writes via the comments section of an English news blog.
One person who won't be hit by layoffs at the Chicago Sun-Times: Garry Steckles. The newspaper "consultant" is a restaurant owner in Saint Kitts, and spends as much time as he can on the beach, but "help[s] out" at the newspaper whenever he's needed. And he's just been promoted, so he's exempt from the job cuts. His secret? Steckles grew up with Editor-in-Chief Michael Cooke. [Chicago Reader]
Safely on the other side of the holiday season, when pink-slips tucked into stockings hanging above smoldering Yule logs would have put a further damper on an already gloomy Christmas in Hollywood (not to mention the SHITCAN CLAUS VISITS WARNER STAFFERS headlines in the trades that would've accompanied such a badly timed move), Warner Bros. has announced to employees that it will kick off the new year with a cheery wave of strike-related layoffs. In a legally mandated, but still heartfelt, letter to studio workers, a WB VP said that an unspecified number of cutbacks—the good news: they may be temporary! The bad news: Did we mention that "cutbacks" means we're firing a bunch of people?— will go into effect by January 18th, according to Variety:
We're hearing that the New York Times has changed its mind about giving buyout packages to six of the employees eliminated in newsroom layoffs announced last month. Instead of a package that would have included benefits for a time, they'll walk away with severance packages, which don't include benefits. A source tells us that the severance packages are worth about a third less than the buyouts originally promised. In November, the Times announced it would cut a dozen newsroom positions and "a number" of clerical administrative jobs.
The Second Life bubble may be popping. Electric Sheep, the marketing firm which helped CSI's a virtual Gary Sinise parade through Linden Lab's online world, is "rightsizing" the company — or shearing off 30 percent of its staff. A vice president explains that while Electric Sheep has seen tremendous growth and isn't in any financial trouble, it decided to lay off 22 employees — mostly Second Life specialists. With its freshly trimmed staff, Electric Sheep will branch out to other virtual worlds platforms — ones advertisers haven't already identified as unfruitful terrain.
A anonymous tipster tells us Palm will lay off 250 employees, confirming our previous report. "The biggest cuts are from OS development," our source says. "[SVP Mark] Bercow wants the OS sold by April or worst case scenario — abandoned." Which seems strange, considering Palm went through some gymnastics just to get is old operating system back from the Japanese company, Access, which had bought it. The rumor, however, jibes with the Wall Street Journal's report last week on former Apple exec and current Palm executive chairman Jon Rubinstein's plans for the company.
Failing biometrics company Pay By Touch has shed 250 employees in the last "couple months," COO Eula Adams said on a call for shareholders today. Of that 250, Adams said new management "took out" 90 employees in the last couple of weeks. The cuts came to "non-core" Pay By Touch initiatives in "healthcare, online, government," Adams said.
At least seven NBC News and CNBC producers and other assorted editorial staff are getting an extra-long holiday vacation. It 'tis the season after all. At least NBC is showing some sense cutting back on its television production staff — CBS Interactive is letting go about 20 CBSNews.com staffers. Apparently the Tiffany network hasn't heard that Web video is the new hotness.
Explaining to the press why your company has just axed a slew of people isn't exactly fun times. It's even less fun when the people who have been fired are also members of the press. People don't like that! Sometimes the best bad-news strategy is to issue a memo providing copy to reporters while saying nothing at all! Like late this afternoon, when CBS News spokesperson Dana McClintock sent out a meaningless statement that says absolutely nothing about today's CBS Interactive layoffs—and everyone actually printed it, from FishbowlNY to the Huffington Post (which at least called it "not that illuminating") to TVNewser to the Observer's Media Mob. How bad is it? Read it for yourself!
Annnnd now they just laid off the guy at CBS Interactive who runs Katie Couric's blog. Yikes!
Nothing spreads holiday cheer like a rosy rash of firings as employees are starting to break out the eggnog. However they may try, there was no fooling CEO Ed Colligan into dispelling rumors he planned to heap coal — pink-slip shaped coal — into 100 stockings. The AP has confirmed that Palm has laid off 10 percent of its work force this week. These 115 souls were sacrificed to "focus and better align resources behind core initiatives" and "to ensure that our expenses are in line with projected revenues." Bah humbug to you, too, Ed. (Photo by lhoon)
The layoffs at CBS are at "CBS Interactive," which is essentially CBSNews.com—and they were unexpected, even though there'd been a hiring freeze in effect for some time. The layoffs seem to be across the whole staff, including producers, designers, a homepage editor. Ten have already been laid-off—according to one source, about 20 are expected in all today. Hmm. Is this whole internet thing not taking off? Seems weird to us, coming just a few weeks before the Iowa caucuses.
Looking for that perfect holiday gift for the suddenly ex-AOLer in your life? Look no further than Valleywag tipster "Bob Zmuda," whose latest additions to the T-shirt line are now on Flickr. Our favorite? Zmuda's commemoration of AOL's 2007 Christmas party. That's the one soon-to-be-laid-off employees weren't invited to, thus discovering their fate.
