Carol Bartz - From Good to Fired

In "Good to Great," Jim Collins discusses the strategy of getting the right people on the bus. Furthermore, his analysis showed that nearly all CEOs who transform their good companies into great companies were not taken externally. While external managers can produce change within a company, their transformation is usually short-lived and ultimately unsuccessful. Yahoo, a company who has recently experienced management turmoil, has followed these same trends predicted by Collins.

Carol Bartz joined Yahoo in January 2009 after investors became dissatisfied with the stagnant growth and indirection under its previous chief, Jerry Yang, a co-founder of the company. Ms. Bartz was viewed as a strong executive leader and her reign was initially met with optimism. In fact, in my Change Management class I took fall 2010, my group did a research report on women who have made great strides in change management. Carol Bartz was one of the five women we researched.

While Bartz was able to attain growth within Yahoo during her tenure, Yahoo’s shares remained essentially flat closing at $12.91 in regular trading on Tuesday. After two years of dissatisfied shareholders, Bartz was final removed from her position. Until a permanent CEO is found, Timothy Morse, the company’s chief financial officer, will serve as the interim chief executive.

Even though Carol Bartz was seen with optimism at the onset of her position as CEO, she actually did more to damage the company than to transform it. I'm sure part of the reason she was unsuccessful was because she was taken from outside the company. Ultimately, Bartz is not a Level 5 leader and did not have the skills to take Yahoo from good to great.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/07/technology/carol-bartz-yahoos-chief-executive-is-fired.html?_r=1