Women executives left Yahoo in U.S. amid layoffs, deal talk

(Reuters) - Women executives left Yahoo Inc (YHOO.O) U.S. operations at an unusually high rate after the technology company announced plans to sell itself earlier this year, but it was not immediately clear why, according to the company's 2016 diversity report, released on Monday.

The sharp drop comes as Silicon Valley faces pressure to diversify a workforce heavily dominated by white and Asian men.

The last year has been turbulent for the web pioneer, which in February announced it would explore alternatives and put in motion a plan to cut about 15 percent of its workforce. In July, it struck a $4.8 billion deal to sell its core internet businesses to Verizon Communications Inc (VZ.N).

The number of women in Yahoo leadership roles in the United States slipped to 21 percent as of June 30, down from 23 percent the year before, the report showed. Women in non-technical jobs remained flat at 52 percent. The total number of women at Yahoo in the United States remained steady at 31 percent.

Yahoo had 8,800 employees at the end of the second quarter, down from 9,400 as at March 31.

It was not clear why there was such a marked decline in the proportion of women leaders at Yahoo, which is led by Silicon Valley's most powerful female CEO, Marissa Mayer.

"Women leaders organically left because other opportunities were more appropriate for them," said Margenett Moore-Roberts, Yahoo's global head of diversity and inclusion. She said most of the women executives who left did so voluntarily after the plan to sell the core company was announced.

She said Yahoo will use a combination of internal searches and promotions, outside recruitment and partnerships with women-focused tech organizations to balance the losses.

The dip in women executives does not seem to be mirrored at other major tech companies. Women held 28 percent of leadership positions at Apple Inc (AAPL.O), according to its latest figures, unchanged from the year before.

After two years, Yahoo wanted to buy Facebook for $1billion

Mark Zuckerberg has led Facebook to become one of the most valuable and respected companies in the world. But despite all of his successes, he rarely talks about the challenges he's faced along the way.

 

In a new interview with Y Combinator president Sam Altman, published on Tuesday, Zuckerberg showed a more vulnerable side when he discussed some of the low points in Facebook's early history, as well as some of his failings.

"One of the hardest parts for me was when Yahoo offered to buy the company for a lot of money," Zuckerberg said. "That was the turning point in the company."

That was 2006. Facebook was about 2-years-old and had 10 million users. Yahoo wanted the company for $1 billion.

Although a lot of people believed Facebook should take the offer, Zuckerberg said he and co-founder Dustin Moskovitz ultimately decided to keep growing the business on their own terms.

"The part that was painful wasn't turning down the offer," he said. "It was the fact that after that, huge amounts of the company quit because they didn't believe in what we were doing."

Facebook's whole management team was gone within a year.

Zuckerberg placed the blame on himself for the exodus.

"I think the fact that I didn't communicate very well about what we were trying to do caused this huge tension," he said. "A lot of folks who joined early on... weren't really aligned with me. ... Being able to sell a [startup] for $1 billion after a couple of years -- that was like a home run [for them]...."

During the 25-minute video interview, Altman also prompted Zuckerberg to explain how Facebook decides which products to test and build.

The Facebook CEO highlighted how it uses a combination of a scientific method -- testing different hypotheses -- and user feedback and data analysis, but added that it wasn't always enough. Facebook's $2 billion acquisition of Oculus in 2014 is proof.

"I actually view that as -- if we'd done a better job of building up some of the expertise to do some of that stuff internally then maybe we wouldn't have had to do that," said Zuckerberg. "We bought the Oculus team for a lot of money ... as CEO, it's your job to not get in a position where you need to be doing these crazy things."

But he conceded that over the course of time, big bets like this will have to be made.

"It's inevitable," said Zuckerberg. "You can't be ahead of everything."