Carol Bartz seems like a pretty plain spoken woman, from what I can tell. I am looking forward to interviewing her at Web 2 this year, she’s one of the first folks to agree to come, and given my conversation with Jerry last year, I think it should prove to be quite a dialog.
I’m enjoying her blog posts on Yahoo Anecdotal. Check this one out, in which she talks about “cleaning house” and restructuring Yahoo (yet again, honestly, it’s like the tenth time in as many quarters, feels like):
Finally, a note about our brand. It’s one of our biggest assets. Mention Yahoo! practically anywhere in the world, and people yodel. But in the past few years, we haven’t been as clear in showing the world what the Yahoo! brand stands for. We’re going to change that. Look for this company’s brand to kick ass again.
I love the willingness to curse, and honestly, I hear it gets a lot saltier in person. Can’t wait.
My Jerry interview (close to his last as Yahoo CEO):
Honesty and frank talk from Carol? I’d expect nothing less.
See http://tinyurl.com/cbartz01 as an example.
Fascinating!
Especially so because IMHO the strongest brands are the language taught in schools. A car is a car because we learned what car means as we acquired language.
Last summer, I actually made an IP lawyer who is familiar with Yahoo LOL (almost ROFL) because I maintained that “yahoo” was first and foremost an English word (granted: it doesn’t have a very clear definition).
But trying to take a natural language term and change it into a brand seems (to me) to be a quite formidable task – indeed: one so difficult that I wouldn’t want to touch it with a 10-foot pole.
So anyone who does attempt such a task gets my recognition (simply for trying).
Bartz stands out even more when you compare her to Schmidt, who talks in honeyed tones.