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Business
商業。
Yahoo
雅虎。
Googling a new boss
從谷歌來的新總裁。
Marissa Mayer takes on one of the toughest jobs in tech
瑪麗莎·梅耶爾接任技術界一份最艱巨的工作。
SHORTLY after news broke on July 16th of her appointment as the new chief executive of Yahoo!, Marissa Mayer revealed that she is expecting her first child later this year. Long-suffering shareholders are hoping that Ms Mayer, who left a senior job at Google to take up her new role, will produce a new Yahoo! as well. But that will not be easy.
7月16日，在瑪麗莎·梅耶爾擔任雅虎新總裁的新聞發布不久之后，她坦言希望在今年晚些時候能夠有第一個孩子。長期受煎熬的股東們希望梅耶爾，這位離開谷歌高層接任雅虎新工作的人同樣能夠締造一個新雅虎。但這并不容易。
After losing their mojo, formerly high-flying tech firms rarely recover it-with a few notable exceptions, such as Apple after Steve Jobs's second coming as boss in 1997. Often, ailing companies lurch from one leader and rescue plan to another while their fortunes fade. That has been the fate so far of Yahoo!, which is now on to its fifth chief executive, including two interim ones, in three years.
在失去他們的運氣之后，原來一帆風順的科技公司能重振旗鼓的寥寥無幾——不過也有一些例外，比如史蒂夫·喬布斯在1997年第二次回歸后的蘋果公司。通常，當他們的財富縮水時，境遇不佳的公司會突然撤換領導，更改解決方案。在這三年中，包括兩位臨時的CEO,現任的是第五位，而這一直是雅虎公司迄今為止的命運。
The size of the challenge facing Ms Mayer was highlighted by the company's second-quarter results, published on July 17th. Overall revenue, at $1.2 billion, was stuck at last year's level and net income fell slightly, to $227m. The firm's share of online-ad revenues in America has also plummeted, falling from 15.7% in 2009 to 9.5% in 2011, according to eMarketer, a research firm.
7月17日所發布的雅虎第二季度的運營結果突出了梅耶爾所面臨的挑戰的困難度。公司的總收入是12億美元，停留在去年同期的水平，且收益凈額稍微有所下降，至2.27億美元。根據一家研究公司eMarketer的數據顯示，雅虎公司在線廣告的份額在美國也直線下滑，從2009年的15.7%下降至2011年的9.5%，
Can Ms Mayer stop the rot? Her fans in Silicon Valley claim that the 37-year-old has the talent to do so. She brings know-how from Google, where she was the 20th employee and was involved in many areas, from its search engine to gmail and Google Maps. She is also a software engineer by training, which should lend her credibility among Yahoo!'s geeks，which should lend her credibility among Yahoo!'s geeks. Throw in that she is an über-networker whose schmoozing skills can charm ad clients, and she seems a good fit.
梅耶爾能讓雅虎峰回路轉么？她的位于硅谷的支持者聲稱37歲的她有能力做到。她帶著技術訣竅從谷歌而來，在谷歌她作為第20位員工并且參與了很多領域的工作，從搜索引擎到谷歌郵箱再到谷歌地圖。通過培訓她也成為了一名軟件工程師，這使她在雅虎的技術精英里有一席之地。此外她還是一位能取悅廣告顧客的交際高手，因此她是這個職位的合適人選。
But not a perfect one. Although Ms Mayer ran a sizeable team at Google, she has never had to turn round an ailing corporate juggernaut with 700m users. Nor has she overseen a huge ad-sales operation and managed a complex international alliance like the one Yahoo! has with Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce behemoth. This is in the process of being unwound, but still needs careful handling.
然而瑪麗莎·梅耶爾并非一個完美的接班人。盡管她在谷歌掌控一支相當大的團隊，但她從不需要拯救一家境遇不佳且擁有7億用戶的行業巨頭。她也不用監管一個龐大的廣告銷售運營系統和處理復雜的國際性合作，如雅虎與中國的電子商務巨頭——阿里巴巴的合作。這是一個需要磨合的過程，但仍需要謹慎處理。
Small wonder, then, that Yahoo!-watchers were stunned by news of Ms Mayer's recruitment. Many had expected Ross Levinsohn, the firm's interim boss and global media head, to get the top job. "Yahoo!'s choice is perplexing," says Brian Wieser of Pivotal Research Group. He thinks Ms Mayer will try hard to keep the talented Mr Levinsohn on board.
于是，雅虎的觀望者對于招聘瑪麗莎·梅耶爾的安排感到震驚，但這不足為奇。很多人認為公司的臨時總裁和國際傳媒負責人羅斯·列維索恩將會得到這個最高職位。關鍵性研究集團的Brian Wieser稱：“雅虎的決定讓人感到費解。”他認為梅耶爾會力挺有才能的列為索恩成為雅虎的高層。
To have a hope of pulling off a Jobs-like turnaround, she will need to tackle three vital tasks fast. First, she must clarify what kind of company Yahoo! wants to be. Some of its former bosses, including Mr Levinsohn, emphasised its plentiful content in areas such as sports and finance. Others trumpeted its whizz-bang technology. This flip-flopping has confused customers and employees.
要想成功實現“喬布斯式”的“峰回路轉”，梅耶爾需要迅速解決三個至關重要的問題。首先，她必須理清雅虎要成為什么樣的公司。包括列維索恩在內的一些雅虎的前任總裁把雅虎大部分精力都集中在像運動和金融這樣的領域。其他的人則是大力推動它的whizz-bang技術。這種相反的發展方向一直困擾著它的顧客和雇員。
Second, Ms Mayer must show how Yahoo! can conquer promising new areas such as the mobile web.This could involve, say, snapping up firms such as Foursquare, which offer services based on a person's location, an area that Ms Mayer knows well from her time at Google.
第二，梅耶爾必須展示出雅虎如何能在像移動互聯網這樣新興的、有前途的領域中取得勝利。這會涉及到收購如Foursquare這樣的公司，它們會提供以人的地理位置為基礎的服務，而這是一個梅耶爾在谷歌工作時就熟知的技術領域。
The third task is to restore battered morale while simultaneously boosting productivity. At Google Ms Mayer had a reputation for prickliness, but also for nurturing talent and helping staff to cope with heavy workloads. Earlier this year she even gave several public talks about the risks of burnout, urging people to discover the "rhythm" that helps them work hard for long periods without losing their drive. Yahoo!'s employees will need to find their own rhythms fast.
第三個問題是在提高公司效率的同時重振受挫的士氣。在谷歌時，梅耶爾的脾氣是出了名的暴躁，但她也因培養人才和幫助員工處理繁重的工作量的能力而著稱。今年早些時候，她甚至多次做了關于過度工作的危險的公開演講，催促人們去發現能夠幫助他們長時間努力工作而不會喪失動力的“工作節奏”。看來雅虎的員工們需要趕緊找到他們自己的“工作節奏”。
