I haven’t been very consistent in blogging, especially about search, largely as it’s been rather tedious. I left the group over a year ago, and for the most part the search offering is pretty much the same as when I left. The market share has eroded. And while there is wild rumors of a plan for a rebranding… well… we’ll see.
I’ve also been very frustrated with Microsoft. I admit, I’m a fan, and Microsoft’s recent actions have left me feeling… well, let’s just say the peanut gallery is unimpressed.
No, it’s worse than that. The peanut gallery is disheartened, and disappointed.
In a recession, there are a number of companies that flail - not just the AIGs and WaMus of the world, but small companies struggling to make a profit. There are lots of companies that hunker down to make it through the lean times. There are a decent number of companies that do well - I work at one. Turns out that discounters, and Amazon.com is one, tend to do fairly well in tough times.
Then, there are a few special companies out there that can actually change things, and be the leaders of a new way of doing things.
Sony comes to mind. Sony is the company that, almost single-handedly, turned “Made in Japan” as a stamp of poor quality trash into a stamp of excellence, completely transforming an entire country’s production after it had been devastated by war.
I would have thought Microsoft could be that company during this recession.
When Balmer announced Microsoft would be laying off 1400 people, out of 90,000, that was about as weak a statement as I’ve seen. Citing that Microsoft wasn’t immune to the global downturn, they laid off 1400, told their employees that 3600 others would also be gone, and that it was time for extreme belt-tightening. All because they only made $2 billion in profit that quarter.
What I had expected was that Microsoft would just say, “Yup, profits are down, but we’re still making $2 billion, so we’re going to invest and come out of this just fine once the economy heats back up.” That had been the SOP for other downturns; if there were layoffs, it was the musical chairs type. Divisions would be re-orged out of existence, and people in them would have 3-6 months to find a new job or go away. Unbeknownst to them but knownst to all the hiring managers, good people were on a “save this person” list, and bad people… weren’t. So things got sorted out pretty quickly.
What I had hoped for was that Microsoft would be that Balmer would come out fighting. Not only would Microsoft be investing its massive earnings now, gearing itself up for when the economy heated up, but Microsoft would be investing heavily. Because of Microsoft’s diverse, and somewhat inelastic, revenue streams, Microsoft could do this. Microsoft was not going to be just another company hunkering down, Microsoft was going to invest for the future. And when that future came, Microsoft would be in a prime position to take advantage of the situation.
At least, that’s what I had hoped for. Ah well.
They do these weenie things because the stockholders are demanding performance every quarter, not continued innovation. I lost my job today because my division had 30% profit and HQ had 15% profit and we were told that both HQ and us needed to reduce costs by 10%. This is going on everywhere….