Hi. Please read the case study on the attached 2 images, and answer the following question.

Please answer: a) why were the issues facing Yahoo described as strategic? and b) Identify examples of issues that fit each of the circles of model (also known as The exploring strategy model or 3-circle model)?

Transcribed Image Text:Yahoo!'s peanut butter manifesto Strategy can involve hard decisions about the scope of the business, its management and its organisation structure. In November 2006, Brad Garlinghouse, MBA graduate and a Yahoo! senior vice president. wrote a memo to his top managers arguing that Yahoo!, the diversified Internet company, was spreading its resources too thinly, like peanut butter on a slice of bread. Edited extracts from the memo follow: Three and half years ago, I enthusiastically joined Yahoo!. The magnitude of the opportunity was only matched by the magnitude of the assets. And an amazing team has been responsible for rebuilding Yahoo!.... But all is not well.... I imagine there's much discussion amongst the Company's senior-most leadership around the challenges we face. At the risk of being redundant, I wanted to share my take on our current situation and offer a recommended path forward, an attempt to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. RECOGNIZING OUR PROBLEMS We lack a focused, cohesive vision for our company. We want to do everything and be everything to everyone. We've known this for years, talk about it incessantly, but do nothing to fundamentally address it. We are scared to be left out. We are reactive instead of charting an unwavering course. We are separated into silos that far too frequently don't talk to each other. And when we do talk, it isn't to collaborate on a clearly focused strategy. but rather to argue and fight about ownership, strategies and tactics.... I've heard our strategy described as spreading peanut butter across the myriad opportunities that continue to evolve in the online world. The result: a thin layer of investment spread across everything we do and thus we focus on nothing in particular. I hate peanut butter. We all should. We lack clarity of ownership and accountability. The most painful manifestation of this is the massive redundancy that exists throughout the organization. We now operate in an organizational structure-admittedly created with the best of intentions that has become overly bureaucratic. For far too many employees, there is another person with dramatically similar and overlapping responsibilities. This slows us down and burdens the company with unnecessary costs. There's a reason why a centerfielder and a left fielder have clear areas of ownership. Pursuing the same ball repeatedly results in either collisions or dropped balls. Knowing that someone else is pursuing the ball and hoping to avoid that collision - we have become timid in our pursuit. Again, the ball drops. We lack decisiveness. Combine a lack of focus with unclear ownership, and the result is that decisions are either not made or are made when it is already too late. Without a clear and focused vision, and without complete clarity of ownership, we lack a macro perspective to guide our decisions and visibility into who should make those decisions. We are repeatedly stymied by challenging and hairy decisions. We are held hostage by our analysis paralysis. We end up with competing (or redundant) initiatives and synergistic opportunities living in the different silos of our company.... SOLVING OUR PROBLEMS We have awesome assets. Nearly every media and communications company is painfully jealous of our
Transcribed Image Text:position. We have the largest audience, they are highly engaged and our brand is synonymous with the Internet. If we get back up, embrace dramatic change, we will win. I don't pretend there is only one path forward available to us. However, at a minimum, I want to be part of the solution and thus have outlined a plan here that I believe can work. It is my strong belief that we need to act very quickly or risk going further down a slippery slope. The plan here is not perfect; it is, however, FAR better than no action at all. There are three pillars to my plan: 1 Focus the vision. 2 Restore accountability and clarity of ownership. 3 Execute a radical reorganization. 1 Focus the vision a) We need to boldly and definitively declare what we are and what we are not b) We need to exit (sell?) non core businesses and eliminate duplicative projects and businesses. My belief is that the smoothly spread peanut butter needs to turn into a deliberately sculpted strategy - that is narrowly focused.... 2 Restore accountability and clarity of ownership a) Existing business owners must be held accountable for where we find ourselves today - heads must roll, b) We must thoughtfully create senior roles that have holistic accountability for a particular line of business..... c) We must redesign our performance and incentive systems. I believe there are too many BU [Business Unit) leaders who have gotten away with unacceptable results and worse - unacceptable leadership. Too often they (wel) are the worst offenders of the problems outlined here. We must signal to both the employees and to our shareholders that we will hold these leaders (ourselves) accountable and implement change.... 3 Execute a radical reorganization a) The current business unit structure must go away. b) We must dramatically decentralize and eliminate as much of the matrix as possible. c) We must reduce our headcount by 15-20%. I emphatically believe we simply must eliminate the redundancies we have created and the first step in doing this is by restructuring our organization. We can be more efficient with fewer people and we can get more done, more quickly. We need to return more decision making to a new set of business units and their leadership. But we can't achieve this with baby step changes. We need to fundamentally rethink how we organize to win.... I love Yahoo!. I'm proud to admit that I bleed purple and yellow. I'm proud to admit that I shaved a Y in the back of my head. My motivation for this memo is the adamant belief that, as before, we have a tremendous opportunity ahead. I don't pretend that I have the only available answers, but we need to get the discussion going: change is needed and it is needed soon. We can be a stronger and faster company - a company with a clearer vision and clearer ownership and clearer accountability. We may have fallen down, but the race is a marathon and not a sprint. I don't pretend that this will be easy. It will take courage, conviction, insight and tremendous commitment. I very much look forward to the challenge. So let's get back up. Catch the balls. And stop eating peanut butter. Source: Extracts from Brad Garlinghouse's memo to Yahool managers, November 2006. Reprinted in Wall Street Journal, 16 November 2006. Questions 1 Why were the issues facing Yahoo! described as strategic? 2 Identify examples of issues that fit each of the circles of the model:

Question

Hi. Please read the case study on the attached 2 images, and answer the following question.

Please answer: a) why were the issues facing Yahoo described as strategic? and b) Identify examples of issues that fit each of the circles of model (also known as The exploring strategy model or 3-circle model)?

Yahoo!'s peanut butter manifesto
Strategy can involve hard decisions about the scope of the business, its management
and its organisation structure.
In November 2006, Brad Garlinghouse, MBA
graduate and a Yahoo! senior vice president.
wrote a memo to his top managers arguing that
Yahoo!, the diversified Internet company, was
spreading its resources too thinly, like peanut
butter on a slice of bread. Edited extracts from
the memo follow:
Three and half years ago, I enthusiastically joined Yahoo!.
The magnitude of the opportunity was only matched by the
magnitude of the assets. And an amazing team has been
responsible for rebuilding Yahoo!....
But all is not well....
I imagine there's much discussion amongst the
Company's senior-most leadership around the challenges
we face. At the risk of being redundant, I wanted to share
my take on our current situation and offer a recommended
path forward, an attempt to be part of the solution rather
than part of the problem.
RECOGNIZING OUR PROBLEMS
We lack a focused, cohesive vision for our company.
We want to do everything and be everything to everyone.
We've known this for years, talk about it incessantly, but
do nothing to fundamentally address it. We are scared
to be left out. We are reactive instead of charting an
unwavering course. We are separated into silos that far
too frequently don't talk to each other. And when we do
talk, it isn't to collaborate on a clearly focused strategy.
but rather to argue and fight about ownership, strategies
and tactics....
I've heard our strategy described as spreading peanut
butter across the myriad opportunities that continue to
evolve in the online world. The result: a thin layer of
investment spread across everything we do and thus we
focus on nothing in particular.
I hate peanut butter. We all should.
We lack clarity of ownership and accountability.
The most painful manifestation of this is the massive
redundancy that exists throughout the organization. We
now operate in an organizational structure-admittedly
created with the best of intentions that has become
overly bureaucratic. For far too many employees, there is
another person with dramatically similar and overlapping
responsibilities. This slows us down and burdens the
company with unnecessary costs.
There's a reason why a centerfielder and a left fielder
have clear areas of ownership. Pursuing the same ball
repeatedly results in either collisions or dropped balls.
Knowing that someone else is pursuing the ball and hoping
to avoid that collision - we have become timid in our
pursuit. Again, the ball drops.
We lack decisiveness. Combine a lack of focus with
unclear ownership, and the result is that decisions are
either not made or are made when it is already too late.
Without a clear and focused vision, and without complete
clarity of ownership, we lack a macro perspective to guide
our decisions and visibility into who should make those
decisions. We are repeatedly stymied by challenging and
hairy decisions. We are held hostage by our analysis paralysis.
We end up with competing (or redundant) initiatives and
synergistic opportunities living in the different silos of our
company....
SOLVING OUR PROBLEMS
We have awesome assets. Nearly every media and
communications company is painfully jealous of our

Transcribed Image Text:position. We have the largest audience, they are highly engaged and our brand is synonymous with the Internet. If we get back up, embrace dramatic change, we will win. I don't pretend there is only one path forward available to us. However, at a minimum, I want to be part of the solution and thus have outlined a plan here that I believe can work. It is my strong belief that we need to act very quickly or risk going further down a slippery slope. The plan here is not perfect; it is, however, FAR better than no action at all. There are three pillars to my plan: 1 Focus the vision. 2 Restore accountability and clarity of ownership. 3 Execute a radical reorganization. 1 Focus the vision a) We need to boldly and definitively declare what we are and what we are not b) We need to exit (sell?) non core businesses and eliminate duplicative projects and businesses. My belief is that the smoothly spread peanut butter needs to turn into a deliberately sculpted strategy - that is narrowly focused.... 2 Restore accountability and clarity of ownership a) Existing business owners must be held accountable for where we find ourselves today - heads must roll, b) We must thoughtfully create senior roles that have holistic accountability for a particular line of business..... c) We must redesign our performance and incentive systems. I believe there are too many BU [Business Unit) leaders who have gotten away with unacceptable results and worse - unacceptable leadership. Too often they (wel) are the worst offenders of the problems outlined here. We must signal to both the employees and to our shareholders that we will hold these leaders (ourselves) accountable and implement change.... 3 Execute a radical reorganization a) The current business unit structure must go away. b) We must dramatically decentralize and eliminate as much of the matrix as possible. c) We must reduce our headcount by 15-20%. I emphatically believe we simply must eliminate the redundancies we have created and the first step in doing this is by restructuring our organization. We can be more efficient with fewer people and we can get more done, more quickly. We need to return more decision making to a new set of business units and their leadership. But we can't achieve this with baby step changes. We need to fundamentally rethink how we organize to win.... I love Yahoo!. I'm proud to admit that I bleed purple and yellow. I'm proud to admit that I shaved a Y in the back of my head. My motivation for this memo is the adamant belief that, as before, we have a tremendous opportunity ahead. I don't pretend that I have the only available answers, but we need to get the discussion going: change is needed and it is needed soon. We can be a stronger and faster company - a company with a clearer vision and clearer ownership and clearer accountability. We may have fallen down, but the race is a marathon and not a sprint. I don't pretend that this will be easy. It will take courage, conviction, insight and tremendous commitment. I very much look forward to the challenge. So let's get back up. Catch the balls. And stop eating peanut butter. Source: Extracts from Brad Garlinghouse's memo to Yahool managers, November 2006. Reprinted in Wall Street Journal, 16 November 2006. Questions 1 Why were the issues facing Yahoo! described as strategic? 2 Identify examples of issues that fit each of the circles of the model:

Accepted Answer

Yahoo is a multinational media and technology corporation that connects people to their interests,…