As most of you know, Jerry Yang co-founder of Yahoo! has taken back the reigns of Yahoo! after Terry Semel stepped down as CEO. There is a great deal of speculation of what Jerry is going to do with Yahoo!. Some of the speculation includes Rupert Murdoch selling MySpace to Yahoo! for a 25% stake in the company. Another highly talked about area is whether Yahoo! would make more money by outsourcing search to Google.

These are some HUGE questions, but before Jerry tackles anything of this magnitude, I think he needs to take a breath and focus on some basics. So I have put together my own little Jerry Yang To Do List.

Jerry, this is for you:

1. Clearly and concisely explain to his employees and share holders what is going to be his main focus for the next 30, 60 and 90 days. Not some high level BS, but be specific. State what you want to do and then come back and communicate what you have found and what you believe it means at the end of each time period.
2. Once you have done your initial exploration, again communicate both internally and externally what direction the company is going in. If you are going to be a content player then state how you are going to do this. What changes will be made immediately and what your expectations are.
3. After you have stated what your vision is and where the company is going, make sure that every employee, manager and director are proceeding down the road that you just mapped out. I have several colleagues who work for Yahoo! and bar none their biggest complaint is the lack of communication and understanding throughout the company. No-one works on an island, define where everyone needs to go and then make sure it is enforced on every level.
4. Begin reaching out to the people most important to you – your users. Begin a conversation, start actually wanting feedback and even more importantly, when you get feedback, do something with that feedback. Make changes, send responses, start showing that under your new regime, Yahoo! is going to get back to focusing on your customers, the people who come to your site each and everyday.
5. Start kicking people in the ass! Yahoo! needs to get back to start up mode and regain that sense of urgency that they lost so long ago. You guys are entering a fight for your lives and every employee needs to understand that. If they don’t because they have lost that loving feeling or have made too much money, it is time to kick those albatrosses to the curb. It’s time Yahoo! gets hungry again!
6. Pick some priorities and make things start to happen now. You have some incredible properties like Yahoo! Mail, Flickr and MyBlogLog that have been languishing under the old Yahoo! regime. It is time you recognize the importance of these and other properties and put the pedal to the medal and get these guys rolling. Get these properties out in front and let them lead as they once did.

That’s it Jerry. I know it is pretty basic, but I think right now Yahoo! needs to go back to the basics. You have any questions, please feel free to drop me a line, we can chat.

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