Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone: The Yahoo Turnaround Plan | 20VC #911

1. 0:00 – 0:39

   Intro

   1. JLJim Lanzone0:00

      (beeping) Three, two, one, zero. You have now arrived at your destination.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings0:09

      Jim, this is such a joy to do. I've had so much fun doing the references for this in preparation, so thank you so much for joining me today, Jim.

   3. JLJim Lanzone0:17

      It's so good to be here, Harry. Big, big, big fan, so it's good to finally be on with you.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings0:22

      Listen, I really needed a bit of an ego inflation, so thank you for that.

   5. JLJim Lanzone0:26

      (laughs)

   6. HSHarry Stebbings0:26

      Uh, but (laughs) I would love to start today.

   7. JLJim Lanzone0:28

      You're rocking that hat.

   8. HSHarry Stebbings0:28

      Just give me that... Uh.

   9. JLJim Lanzone0:29

      I think you know, I think you know how, how awesome you are.

   10. HSHarry Stebbings0:32

       I mean, you're just teasing people who are listening on podcasts and not watching TikToks.

   11. JLJim Lanzone0:36

       (laughs)

   12. HSHarry Stebbings0:36

       But I wanna start today with a little on your inc-

2. 0:39 – 3:08

   Jim’s career and becoming CEO of Yahoo

   1. HSHarry Stebbings0:39

      I mean, 25 years plus now in the industry, how did you make your way first into the tech industry, and then kind of skipping a little bit, (laughs) a little bit, uh, how did you come to be CEO of Yahoo most recently?

   2. JLJim Lanzone0:52

      Well, I'll give you the, um, the, the quick, uh, Wikipedia, you know, origin story. So I, I had had never had a real job. I, I wound up in law school, uh, which worked. I met my wife. I hated it. I switched to business school and wound up, this is the middle of, of the internet in-, uh, industry starting, I wound up as a product manager as a summer job. Got really cocky with a couple classmates, started a company outta school. By the day we graduated, we already had a couple million in funding and a few million users of our website, you know, at the time. Uh, and had the full Web 1.0 ride. Uh, we ra- we raised $50 million, we were gonna go public, and then we crashed like you wouldn't believe with the crash. We sold what was left to Ask Jeeves, uh, which is pretty much the only company that wanted us. Uh, I got really lucky and they hired me as the head of product there, and we went on, I think, probably the best turnaround run of the 2000s. We 50X'd that stock. We became, uh, a leading innovator in the space with a brand that, you know, was, uh, not that, you know, popular and, and kind of the poster child of the crash. We sold it to IAC and I became CEO as part of that transition. I wound up working for Barry Diller for many years. Left and did another startup. Uh, Bill Gurley and Jeff Yang were my investors. It was called Clicker. It was internet TV guide or search engine. Um, you know, we were looking at ahead at internet TV in 2008 and '09, so a little early. Uh, we wound up selling that to CBS in 2011. I became CEO of CBS Interactive. I was there for nine years. Uh, left with the Viacom merger, uh, after, you know, I think, uh, you know, we had a really good run there. And became the CEO of Tinder during COVID. And then, in the middle of all that, I met the guys from Apollo who were just buying Yahoo, and it was a company that I'd known a long time and had really been building up over time, I think, to become, uh, you know, the right person to take this amazing asset and drive it forward. So I, I made the big leap last September and, and became CEO.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings2:57

      As CEO of Tinder for a while, I am pleased to say that I contributed to 50% of your revenues. Um... (laughs)

   4. JLJim Lanzone3:03

      (laughs) There you go.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings3:05

      Um, but... There we go. Um, but I do wanna say-

3. 3:08 – 7:00

   What part of your history are you rebelling from?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings3:08

   2. JLJim Lanzone3:08

      (laughs)

   3. HSHarry Stebbings3:08

      ... uh, you know, I, I love this question. I, I, I only just kind of discovered it, but I think it's so revealing of people and it's, you know, if we think about all being a functions of our histories, you mentioned your incredible kind of journey there. What parts of your history do you think you're rebelling from, and what parts of your history do you think you're running towards?

   4. JLJim Lanzone3:27

      (laughs) That is a deep question to start off with. Um...

   5. HSHarry Stebbings3:32

      (laughs) Don't... I, I do this on the first date, which is why I'm sitting here.

   6. JLJim Lanzone3:34

      This is self-examine. Yeah, exactly. Um, the truth is, probably a lot of it comes from the failure of that first startup. I mean, we were, I was in my 20s when we did it. We, we were successful beyond what we'd imagined, and, uh, and really made it, and then it really cr- crashed hard and we had to lay people off and it, it was, you know, that 2000, 2001 time period was rough. And, uh, and, and, you know, then I joined Ask Jeeves and I was literally announced on September 11th, 2001. That was the press release of my joining Ask Jeeves-

   7. HSHarry Stebbings4:13

      (laughs)

   8. JLJim Lanzone4:14

      ... uh, to run product. And we were the poster child of the crash, and people loved to kick that brand when it was down. Um, but it had, it was my first experience with, with understanding the bones of a potential turnaround. And the fact that, in the face of people kicking us when we were down and being the underdog and not being taken seriously, the fact that we could then, you know, have become a, a leading innovator in the space, we were later called the Apple of Search, believe it or not, (laughs) by people in the search industry. And just being really proud of that turnaround and what we were able to accomplish there, I think wound up driving a lot of my decision-making later. Um, although when I left, you talked about running from something, I had turned down a public company CEO job, um, in my early 30s or, or mid-30s, uh, to do a startup from scratch, uh, again, which was probably a weird decision and one I'm probably still lamenting, but I think I just had to prove to myself again that, uh, I could make it work. Um, that wound up selling to CBS and, and, you know, we went from there. Um, so what I'm bring-

   9. HSHarry Stebbings5:19

      Can I, can I, can I ask you, Jim-

   10. JLJim Lanzone5:20

       Yeah, go ahead.

   11. HSHarry Stebbings5:20

       ... do you think you have a chip, do you have a chip on your shoulder still?

   12. JLJim Lanzone5:24

       Yeah, and I think a lot of the great people do. I mean, I don't think I do in a, um, a r- a negative way. You know, I, I think the chip is, is always, um, wanting to prove myself, but also I've, I've, I've just grown to like situations where we do things that surprise people, where we turn the tables and make our competitors jealous of us, uh, where we build great teams who love being there and the word gets out, like, you know, that's where I should go work. I remember at Ask, you know, we were in Oakland and Berkeley in the middle (laughs) of the dot-com, you know, the, the 2000s. We went from, you know, layoffs and, and not being respected to people commuting across the bridge to come to Oakland to work for us.... because things are going so well and people respected us. And that, you know, you talk about running towards something, you know, that, that, that innovation and growth from the ashes that we were able to do there, and I've, I've done it now at multiple places, uh, you know, whether it's growing the business or innovating and leading the industry in innovation, like those are the things I just love doing. And, uh, and, and it's addicting.

   13. HSHarry Stebbings6:32

       Uh, totally is addicting. Now I, I have structures for the shows, as you know, um, and then I kind of talk a little bit to you, and I, uh, speak to Renata this morning and Reid this morning, and I'm like, "Ah, fuck it. We're gonna change it up actually." Um, and I really-

   14. JLJim Lanzone6:46

       (laughs)

   15. HSHarry Stebbings6:46

       ... actually wanna focus specifically on your leadership because, you know, it was Reid at Apollo who said y- (laughs) uh, I, I hope I'm allowed to say this, um, he said you're the best CEO he's ever worked with.

   16. JLJim Lanzone6:56

       Oh, geez.

   17. HSHarry Stebbings6:57

       That's quite a s- that's quite a statement.

   18. JLJim Lanzone6:59

       (laughs)

   19. HSHarry Stebbings6:59

       Um,

4. 7:00 – 9:46

   What does high performance mean to you?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings7:00

      so let's talk about performance and leadership. When we think about high performance in business, what does high performance mean to you when I say those words?

   2. JLJim Lanzone7:11

      You know, I went to UCLA, uh, and there's a famous basketball coach in the US who is the most famous basketball coach I think in history named John Wooden, and he had this saying that was, "Never mistake activity for achievement." And, you know, I think that high performance is understanding what achievement means, you know, what are you really trying to do, and, um, and really putting things in place to go make that happen. Um, the first thing always that that starts with is a high performing team, right? You can't do everything yourself, especially at scale. And so, for me, it really starts with people. And putting a high performing team together I think is one of my, has become one of my core competencies. Um, and, and I really... when I'm hiring people, I really hire for four things. Uh, the first is, I really want domain experts, right? I do not want people who are faking it till they make it. Uh, and if you are an expert, you tend to be able to understand what one looks like. Um, and it always starts there. The second is, I want people with high EQ. Uh, high IQ is easy to get. People with high EQ, who, you know, are good teammates, that, that, you know, they don't view things as a ser- zero sum game against the other people in the company, you know, they understand that life is dramatic enough, they don't need to create drama, um, they understand why diversity is important, you don't have to explain it to them, they can prioritize, they can debate in a healthy way, they have self-doubt, (laughs) you know, which I think is important to improve products, um, and, uh, and if I have those two things, experts who have high EQ, I, I, I really am a- most of the way there. But I also like people who, the third would be the people who are naturally ambitious, so meaning like not I win you lose, like, politically ambitious, but, you know, I think we all know people who just are... or, uh, you know, maybe it 'cause of that chip on your shoulder, but people who are just naturally ambitious and wanna win, and the last is love of the game. There's a reason why they wanna work at this company. I, I would say if it's an accountant, why do they wanna work here and not at Clorox, right? You could be an accountant anywhere, but do you love sports, do you love entertainment and TV, do you love search, do you love, you know, uh, you know, Yahoo Finance? It, it, you know, you put those things together, and in my experience, you get a high performing team. Um, and if you can-

   3. HSHarry Stebbings9:33

      That's-

   4. JLJim Lanzone9:33

      ... do that and just be v- yeah, go ahead.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings9:35

      I, I, I'm, I'm just intrigued 'cause I love those four kind of core traits. The, the thing that I find challenging is bluntly unpacking them and discovering (laughs) them. Um, you said to me before the episode

5. 9:46 – 12:55

   What is your interview process?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings9:46

      that you don't ask standard interview questions. I'm re- I, I, m-

   2. JLJim Lanzone9:50

      (laughs)

   3. HSHarry Stebbings9:50

      ... I, I actually didn't ask you before-

   4. JLJim Lanzone9:51

      Yeah.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings9:51

      ... because I thought I'd save it for now. Um-

   6. JLJim Lanzone9:54

      Yeah.

   7. HSHarry Stebbings9:55

      ... what did you mean by that? And then how do you discover, unpack, question to determine whether people have those four traits?

   8. JLJim Lanzone10:03

      So, I think people hide behind standard interview questions if they don't really know what they're looking for. And maybe the more junior you are, the more you kinda have to rely on those, you know? But I, I always think about, you know, the reputations of some of the trillion dollar internet companies and the tricky questions that they're asking people. Even when they do tests, by the way, for engineers, you know, I've seen really smart people not make it through those tests who could have been great engineers if they'd been mentored the right way and people saw the raw materials there. So I think people miss everything between the lines when they're asking standard interview questions, you know? "Tell me about a challenging time that you (laughs) overcame something." "Tell me..." You, you know, it just... How about you just really get to know somebody and do that through a conversation? And I promise you that if you do that, what they really know about the things you need to know come out. Whether they have EQ and, and the characteristics I described about that, they come out. But the other part of that is, I don't do it in one sitting. So I'll trip people out sometimes by saying, "It was so great to spend that hour with you. I'll circle back and then we'll go get lunch." And then I'll bring them back a third time, and then I'll have them interview with my core team who all already represent a lot of that and understand how they would fit culturally. Um, and, uh, and then, you know, the last thing is, I'll talk to people who know them. And one of the benefits of being around 25 years now, uh, is, you know, you know a lot of people. And so people's reputations do precede them in a number of ways. And again, it might be a different fit here. The things I might need here might not be what they needed at the last company where maybe it didn't even work out. But I need to get to know who they really are. And that's... you know, I'd s- yeah, I'd say at this point I, I get these hires right the majority of the time.

   9. HSHarry Stebbings11:46

      W- when you're getting to know them in that way, can I ask are there commonalities in the areas where you focus? Is it childhood? Is it insecurities? Is it young entrepreneurship activities? Is it p- parental relationships? Are there areas where you find revealing in terms of getting to know people? If it's not the standard, respectfully, what is it?

   10. JLJim Lanzone12:11

       I don't, I honestly, Harry, don't think there's a standard for that. I think it's a conversation. I am trying to eventually get to what they know, how they operate, right? There are a million companies at the bottom of the ocean that have perfect sounding mission statements or have, you know, val- I truly believe your company values are the people you hire. Like, that is 90% of it. It's also, you know, what you accept and condone, what you criticize and don't allow. It's, it is... And so, th- I think those values come out in, in, in these conversations as you're getting to know people. And again, let's go back to why I'm doing this. It really is an interview, um, but I'd say it's different for every person and, and yeah, getting to know their origin story, and sometimes I'll just ask that,

6. 12:55 – 15:10

   Biggest hiring mistakes

   1. JLJim Lanzone12:55

      um, is part of it.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings12:56

      Can I ask what have been your biggest hiring fuck-ups? (laughs) You learn from mistakes. You've been doing this for 25 years. Respectfully, there must be some.

   3. JLJim Lanzone13:04

      (laughs) Yeah. Well, in the old days, I'd say I was... You know, what happened after the Web 1.0 crash, or even during that time, it was, you know, later on, 19-year-olds were CEOs of companies, and that was cool. But in the '90s, we were all told, "You can't do it. You better hire some grownups." And they usually came from consulting or P- or P&G, right? And that led to success, uh, over excellence, process over, you know, how you end... I fell into that trap, you know? I remember eBay had a lot of people during the time, but they, they lacked EQ. They lacked, uh, knowing what good looks like. They lacked that right brain, uh, like a band, not like a symphony, right? You're not writing sheet music and chucking it over the wall for someone to play. The best product development happens when you're all working together, and that goes back, for me, to how I built my first products in the '90s. Um, and so, I think, you know, not, not trusting that, not really knowing what I was looking for in the early days, and then the second would be... ... up here and, and, and maybe this won't work. I tell you, when I have that intuition, you know, I've, I've, I've made the wrong hire.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings14:16

      Speaking of intuition, when people maybe are a question or a concern, a mentor of mine said to me, "When there's doubt, there's no doubt." Do you agree with that?

   5. JLJim Lanzone14:25

      Product people, for example, swimming in self-doubt about qua- the quality of something, and they're always seeking more and, and, and, and questioning. That, that leads you, by the way, back to data and things that can help inform yourself. Um, I, I think people who are... um, can, uh, you know, or, or, or go by that, they, they just won't take risks often enough, and, and I actually think dou- doubt can inform risk. But I, I would say, when I hear a sentence like that, I think that's too, uh, concrete, and I don't think life is like that.

   6. HSHarry Stebbings14:58

      Can I ask you, I, I spoke to Renate before, and she mentioned a time at Tinder when you brought, um, a demo of the videos that you wanted to bring to Tinder, and you showed it to the board, and then you made it happen

7. 15:10 – 18:46

   How do you keep product velocity with scale?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings15:10

      within three months. My immediate question was, as a leader, how do you think about bringing real product velocity and real execution speed at, respectfully, a company Tinder's size and now Yahoo's size, where generally things become a lot slower? How do you retain speed with scale?

   2. JLJim Lanzone15:30

      Yeah, I don't, I don't believe they have to be slower in a big company. Um, Tinder, like, like Ask, was a one product company, right? Tinder was a one product company. And so really, I was the chief product officer, and it was really easy to, to push. In that example, though, and I think this is something that I'm, I've gotten to be pretty good at is, I unblocked things that had been in the queue for a long time. We had some really talented product people on the Tinder team who had developed the majority of that video demo that we kind of called our dream board video, what the future of Tinder could look like. I didn't make it. I didn't direct them to. I heard about it, and I said, "Hell yeah, let's go for that. Let's see what that looks like." I saw it, I helped them tweak it with my opinion, which is usually what I do. You know, it's not just me. I, I feedback and, and have good product, you know, sensibility too, and I let them go. And, and that, that video was really compelling. You know, Tinder hadn't evolved in quite a long time on the consumer front. They'd done a lot on the business model front, uh, but they had not... You know, you being a, a big subscriber. But (laughs) on the con- on the consumer feature side, not a ton. And that video just showed all these possibilities, not all of which are gonna make it to market, but everybody who saw that video was like, "When can we have that?" In- and internally for the board, and so once you have that, it's really easy to get the company unblocked, uh, and, and moving.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings17:00

      What are the most common reasons for blockage?

   4. JLJim Lanzone17:04

      I do think it goes back to these qualities of a great manager or, or employee, and, and oftentimes, there are people in positions of product power, product roadmap power who either are not great at being the hub or the quarterback for the groups around them, so you're not able to get buy-in and give all the groups due process. I always say that once you get through that process, you know, again, 'cause I started as a product manager, essentially, um, you know, everybody should feel they've fed into that. So even when you, when you aren't doing what they wanted to do, they understand why you made this decision. And hopefully, oftentimes, they feel it was their idea, even. Maybe it was their idea. Um, so that, that, that's a big part of it. Uh, and a lot of times, people wind up with battlefield promotions or different reasons why they got to a position of, you know, power and product, where they're not great decision makers, or maybe the people above them... You know, I always say, like, I wouldn't be great at being the CEO of different kinds of companies, but I've done consumer internet for 25 years. (laughs) I know how to run this kind of company, right? So it's easy for me to say, "Let's go for it," and get things out of the way. It also helps I came out of product management, which I think make...... not all the time, but usually, you know, it's, it's, it's best for a CEO of an internet company to have been out of product, you know. Or s- being a founder is almost the same thing. So, um, so that, you know, that, that's probably why.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings18:33

      I think one of the most challenging elements in leadership is prioritization. We mentioned, obviously, the, the video introduction there at Tinder. One has to then make that a priority, one has to take that to the board. Um, what I wanna focus on, actually,

8. 18:46 – 21:20

   How do you determine what to prioritize?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings18:46

      is prioritization framework, is how do you think about what you determine what to prioritize on given there are already so many things that you can choose? How do you determine where to focus versus where not to?

   2. JLJim Lanzone19:01

      I mean, I don't, I don't wanna be too simplistic about it, but it really does come down to ROI. You know, I was, that was drilled into me a long time ago and now, now look, how you determine ROI gets more complicated.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings19:14

      Yeah.

   4. JLJim Lanzone19:15

      Uh, the, the first is, you really do have to understand the data. You know, I hired somebody recently ... Well, let me put another way. I took over a group recently where, when we went through the business planning process, I asked questions about the user experience and what was important to users. You know, you know, what was the user journey? You know, where are you trying to get them in that journey? Um, you know, what are the points of monetization we're trying to get them to, you know, and what priority, priority order do they want certain features? I think of those as the most basic of basics. And, the group had never really asked those questions. And I hired somebody who came in, that's how they spent their first 48 hours. That's how I would've spent my first (laughs) 48 hours. And I think if you understand that, it becomes, it starts to really become clear where you're underperforming, you know, where you can push buttons with the user experience to drive, you know, retention or frequency or loyalty, um, and get people into the kill zones of monetization where, where you really wanna get them to. And, and so if you understand that, all of a sudden prioritization of a roadmap can become really clear. Now, the other very important thing, and I think teams do miss this, is, you know, you have to think short, medium, and long-term. So, you don't just wanna do the basics and fix those. You wanna actually, you know, make some meaningful growth, uh, you know, take advantage of some meaningful growth opportunities, and you do wanna leave room in the roadmap for some big swings. And then you'll play Tetris with all those resources and the schedule to, to get it done. You know, you're gonna have some big projects and, and small projects to fit it in. So I think of prioritization as a balanced breakfast of, of all of these things, um, you know, fitting together. What do you wanna get out of that at the end of the day is growth. Right? You can say, "At my mission," you can paint all kinds of fancy words on it. My mission is growth at the end of the day. And, and if you're the head of product, like, that's how you have to think about it.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings21:12

      Can we, can we unpack-

   6. JLJim Lanzone21:13

      And so what's your return on investment?

   7. HSHarry Stebbings21:14

      ... can, can, can we unpack growth? And I mean that respectfully, but it's like growth of what?

   8. JLJim Lanzone21:19

      Yeah.

   9. HSHarry Stebbings21:19

      Growth

9. 21:20 – 23:43

   How do you define growth?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings21:20

      of user base? Like growth of retented u- or retentive users? Growth of monetization on a monthly basis? Like how do you determine growth? 'Cause more users doesn't necessarily mean more growth. Uh, d- do you know what I mean? Eh, eh, in, so how-

   2. JLJim Lanzone21:35

      100%. Uh, we ... Yeah. I mean, again, and, and let's just say this is consumer internet (clears throat) from my point of view. So, to your point, you, you can't have one without the other. They all have to come along. (laughs) And so in a search engine, that's very easy. You have to have query growth, right? And your monetization is pretty linear off of that in search, because you know what the, the revenue per thousand searches is. You, you really just have to, to, uh, to increase the number of searches as long as you have that monetization in balance. With a, uh, you know, a, an, an ad supported, you know, model and display, of course you need the user experience and you need growth at X percent, uh, to be able to, to monetize. If you over-monetize, and I do think there's an inflection point, which is why I always say you wanna optimize, not maximize, you know, either one of the, these things. Right? Revenue or the user experience. They need to be at this point of optimization where they're both growing at a healthy rate. And, look, you can say this is rocket science and try to make it more complicated than it is, I don't think so. You know, it's, it's, it's pretty easy to look at the di- data and understand where you're, um, under-optimized (laughs) and where the focus needs to be. And over the long term, they all need to come along. So, that's why I say short, medium, and long-term. Now, that can apply to your quarterly product roadmap, and, but another way to do it is your annual planning process. And I'm, I have a very specific (laughs) way of doing that. And at the end of the day, that, that plan has to be A plus B plus C equals D, you know, for this outcome that you want, uh, this return on investment you're gonna get for, you know, for your roadmap. And that's something I put my teams through every year.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings23:22

      Can I ask, how do you think about the balance between the short term and the long term? You know, if the short term is like, bluntly, as soon as possible, incqueese quer- inc- incqueese (laughs) increase queries, um, that's the short term, which will allow you in the long term to have product expansion, market expansion, more resources for expansionary

10. 23:43 – 24:51

    How do you balance short vs long term thinking?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings23:43

       products, teams. How do you think about that balance between the short and the long term in your thinking?

    2. JLJim Lanzone23:50

       Well, I'll just say it's different every time. So, it, at Ask, you know, you're, you, um ... I think you get this a lot, but you're probably too young to remember the original Ask Jeeves product. It was a question and answer product that was essentially manual, and it showed up at the top of the page 90% of the ... and, and how we looked at the data, and was only clicked on 25% of the time. And so, it also became the butt of a joke from, as a brand, that it didn't work. In a entirely different situation, uh, at CBS Interactive, we ran a portfolio of brands.... and we did it by turning around CNET, which is a public company acquired by CBS, and really goosing revenue on CNET to pay for the subscription opportunity that we saw in streaming. And again, this is 2011, '12, '13, leading into '14, and we launched five years before Disney+. An obvious investment, and so we had to self-fund for the long term. So again, you know, every company is going to be different in how you think about it, but that's the fun of the job.

11. 24:51 – 25:38

    Are CEOs the best resource allocators?

    1. JLJim Lanzone24:51

       That's why I love doing it.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings24:52

       Do you believe the best CEOs are the best resource allocators?

    3. JLJim Lanzone24:56

       Yeah, it's a fundamental around you. Again, I would, I will always point you back to the fact that I, I do think I am, you know, really good at certain things. Product is one of them. Um, you know, culture building's always been really important to me. But I, I, it is a, it is a huge misnomer to say that anybody can, can be a s- a great CEO by being a dictator. It just doesn't work that way. So dictator is resource allocator, roadmap, anything. You are a ringleader. Same team, they would say I didn't o-operate that like a dictator, either, you know? I, I treated it like I was the ringleader. But, but you gotta do it as a team.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings25:32

       Can I ask, I think, you know, moments of hardship can often shape you as a leader. When you think about

12. 25:38 – 27:19

    Painful lessons learned

    1. HSHarry Stebbings25:38

       really painful lessons learned, is there one really painful lesson you learned that you were actually, on reflection, pleased to have gone through, and what did you take from it?

    2. JLJim Lanzone25:49

       I am both fortunate and unfortunate enough to have been through a lot of really trying times and come out the other side in a really good spot almost every time. Not the first startup, and that was super, super painful for everybody involved, and we all felt, you know, I think we all felt really hurt by, by that not, not working. You know, the, the '90s startup. Um, but every other one, you know, I just think the trying times that we went through, you know, when I got to Ask, they were ro- it was post-9/11. There were rolling blackouts in California. People were taking sodas from the m- machine home at night. They had gone from, you know, a, a $10 billion valuation to $100 million (laughs) valuation. It was t- it was rough. So to have come through the other side, I mean, that, that was, was just such a validating r- you know, experience, it gives you confidence. But then when I did the next startup, you know, and again, I had Bill Gurley behind me, I mean, very, Jeff Yang, like, the best investors. You know, I accepted money and the, and the, the crash of 2008 happened two weeks later. I offered to give them money back, uh, and they said, (laughs) "No, just, just go ahead," because some of the best companies can be created in times like this, and you and I know now that how, how true that was for, for the 2008 crash. Um, so to have landed that plane, yeah.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings27:07

       I, sorry, I have to dig in on that.

    4. JLJim Lanzone27:09

       (laughs) Okay.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings27:09

       But speaking of the crash there, um, you know, this is the first crash that I and many other people have seen in their professional career. Uh, it's quite fucking unnerving, to be honest

13. 27:19 – 31:18

    How to survive a financial crash

    1. HSHarry Stebbings27:19

       with you, Jim. (laughs) Um, uh, tell me, what are your biggest lessons on how to survive a crash?

    2. JLJim Lanzone27:25

       The f- the first one is knowing that, you know, and I, I've been counseled on this even for, for the situation now, but the first is to protect your balance sheet, right? That's very obvious. Uh, you, you have to be able to live to, to fight another day. Uh, the second is to realize that this is a huge opportunity. If you can be one of the companies that threads the needle and comes out the other side, you know, that is an amazing opportunity to be able to, uh, you know, to take over, uh, you know, take market share or to, you know, take over some of your competitors. Um, it could be, it can be a great opportunity. Uh, the third, I think, is you do, as a CEO especially, but as a leader, you, you do need to be a source of optimism. You know, I don't know if you ever, you know, being in London, if you ever read, uh, a book called The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson, but it's about the Blitz and, and, uh, you know, the Blitz of, of London in, in World War II. And Churchill was this amazing source of optimism when they all thought they were gonna die, right? (laughs) They were just getting obliterated every night, and it turned out he was right. You know, obviously they made it through and won, and won the war, but, but it didn't feel like that at the time. And I think, you know, the more that you can have built trust and authenticity with your team, uh, and they can really believe in you, uh, that'll help get them through to the other side.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings28:52

       Protect your balance sheet, I'm with you. Trouble is, Jim, I don't know how long this is gonna last. And the one thing that I'm worried about, and I always advise founders against, is multiple cuts. You know, cut deep and do it once, but don't do multiple rounds of layoffs. That's really hard. How do you know how much to cut? Is it 20%? Is it 25%? Like, h- how would you advise a portfolio company if it was me saying, "Uh, f- you've got 12 months. Do, do I literally cut 50%?" How do I know?

    4. JLJim Lanzone29:26

       You know, I mean this very specifically, not to change the, the, the way to think about this. You cannot possibly know the answer to that unless you're in that specific company. And we can talk more about this when you think about how to fix a company or how to take one over and, and mistakes people make when they do that, you know, coming in thinking they know everything from the outside. I truly believe a rule of thumb on this situation does not exist. And I also think that if you've built off- you know, uh, trust and credibility in, in an authentic way with your team, then, you know, the one cut versus different cuts, I mean, that, that isn't true either, right? Because you're getting different information at different times. I think you have to make the best decision you can at that time. Now, the thing you need to be careful of is not to underestimate because you've only lived through 13 years of growth and haven't been through all these crashes, uh, you know, underestimating how long this could last or estimating how harsh it could be.... and, you know, I heard Brian Chesky speak recently on, on the cuts he made at Airbnb, uh, and, you know, during, you know, the initial, uh, COVID crash in 2020, and two things happened, right? One is they, they, they did what they needed to do, uh, balance sheet wise. The second was, they actually discovered they were a better company when they were meaner. You know? It, it only took three people to walk the sandbag down to the river. It didn't take 10 (laughs) . And so, you know, you move faster, you move with more clarity, you probably move better. Um, some of that can be freeing. So I, I, I wouldn't ... You know, I think, and I wouldn't think about this as there's one rule of thumb for any company, but if you have a, a good group of people around you to help make the decision, I think you can get it right.

14. 31:18 – 33:53

    How to lead through a crash

    1. JLJim Lanzone31:18

    2. HSHarry Stebbings31:18

       You said point number three, optimism and trust. If you are optimistic in the times of Winston Churchill style, where everything is going to shit and you are still saying, "We'll be fine," your team will lose trust. How do you think about the balance between being eternally optimistic and retaining trust when everything is not okay?

    3. JLJim Lanzone31:41

       Yeah, I mean, two things. One is you can't be an ideologue, right? And same thing, you have to fight, fight the, the battle that exists on the ground, and in their case, they were fighting back. I don't wanna get too much into history here. But they were fighting back and, and having some success with that. It just was tough, and that's what going through a crash period can be like, (laughs) you know? And the days are long, but the years are short, and, and, uh, but those day- you know, those long days can really be rough. Uh, and so you don't wanna be an ideologue, and, and part of it is just being honest and unscripted and, uh, and direct and, and having a team of people around you, if you've hired that the right way, where their teams trust them. And, and I, so I, you know, I think of these companies as ecosystems, so I don't, I wouldn't again put it on one person, but hopefully you, hopefully you've created that, uh, that, that ecosystem. The other part of not being an ideologue is adjusting your business model, right? Go back to Airbnb. They cut down to the core old Airbnb product just at the right time when it turned out that's exactly what people wanted in the summer of 2020, was they wanted to go rent houses, right? They couldn't travel. They couldn't fly. Um, how do you need to adjust your business, business model? How do you need to adjust your valuation expectations, right? I, I, we just came through this period where, I swear to God, a company with only 10,000 registered users wanted me to pay $150 million for them. A company with 79,000 users wanted someone to pay $500 million for them. You are going to have to adjust your expectations coming through this. And, you know, I think Bill Grohey has written a lot about this on Twitter. So, so again, don't be an ideologue, and, and I think the optimism will, uh, you know, will, will hit well. (laughs)

    4. HSHarry Stebbings33:34

       To be fair, I didn't ask for 500 million. I said 450, Jim.

    5. JLJim Lanzone33:37

       (laughs)

    6. HSHarry Stebbings33:37

       I thought I was being reasonable. So unfair of you to bring that up, okay? Uh, no.

    7. JLJim Lanzone33:42

       (laughs)

    8. HSHarry Stebbings33:42

       I, I, I get you totally. The only question I'd have there before we talk about turnarounds quickly is, that takes great communication with your board and with your stakeholders in terms of business model changes, in

15. 33:53 – 36:12

    Advice to founders on board communication

    1. HSHarry Stebbings33:53

       terms of valuation expectation changes, and I always feel that actually young and first-time founders are never coached on board communication. What advice would you give to founders on what great board communication looks like when it comes to changes to business model, changes to valuation, hard topics which are not easy to discuss really?

    2. JLJim Lanzone34:16

       Well, look, if you're a founder and you've put this board together, then hopefully this problem was solved before it even got started. Meaning, you picked investors who were truly on your side, who have high EQ, who will back you when you need it, be rough on you when you need it, um, but not, you know, turn and run for the hills or, or try to cut you out. You know, I think that, that's, that goes back to who you selected in the first place, which could mean don't just pick a VC due to the brand name. Don't ju- (laughs) you know, whether it's a firm or the person. Um, really make sure you're getting it right. Don't just go for the highest valuation, uh, that you could possibly get. People have learned that lesson now. But make sure you're getting the right board. You know, I also had a great independent board member at Cliquer, uh, Blake Krikorian, who, you know, became a great friend of mine, who's the founder of Slingbox. Blake was an independent who was really hard on me, but he was an entrepreneur and he understood where I was coming from. I think having a good independent on there can be helpful, too. So ho- so (laughs) that's number one. Um, number two is, in managing that board, man, I mean, first of all, hopefully they know it's a turnaround, right? Or hopefully they understand it's, it's a, it's a crash in a rough market. Um, because if, uh, I always say, you know, I don't wanna have to have a board or a boss ever again who, to use a metaphor, doesn't believe that climate change exists, where every time I have to go in, I have to re-explain it to them and convince them it exists. I really want a team where we just know, we're all on the same page, it's just about strategy for what to do about it, right? It's exhausting to do it the other way. I've had to do that several times, and uh, I'll never do it again. Uh, so hopefully that's the board you're d- you're dealing with. (laughs) Um, you know, you also like to-

    3. HSHarry Stebbings36:08

       On, on the-

    4. JLJim Lanzone36:08

       Yeah, go ahead. Sorry.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings36:09

       Now, on the turnaround side, the thing that's just striking

16. 36:12 – 37:52

    How to turn around a struggling company

    1. HSHarry Stebbings36:12

       bluntly when we look at your career is the amount of successful turnarounds you've had. I mean, it's very difficult to have one successful turnaround. You've had, you know, four now? Well, Yahoo will be your fourth, I think. Um, uh, my question to you is, what are the commonalities in what have you- you have done that's worked first?

    2. JLJim Lanzone36:32

       Yeah, you know, I've learned over time that-... uh, you do have, eh, eh- you know how they say a house has great bones? You know, for these shows where they renovate houses? (laughs) Y- you can't, you do have to start with, with good bones, uh, on the house. And for me, the first one of those, or the commonalities between, you know, the, these situations is, you, you have a lot of traffic, is, is one big thing that helps. Uh, you have a brand that's maybe seen better days but you can do something with, or at the very least is well known. Uh, you have underdeveloped products, maybe bad products, but for some reason they've been sticky in their own way. I can talk about those. And then you have org, organizations that, you know, probably have not been optimized, whether that's great people or they have the wrong structure in place. And again, I've seen all of those. They usually all exist at once, uh, in every one that I've been part of. But if I have traffic (laughs) and I have a brand that's known and I have products that people are loyal to even if they've, you know, it's been a while since they've been optimized properly, th- then I can do the rest. And, you know, bring in great people, getting the road map going the right way. If you get those things, well, then the brand has a chance to do things again and you can build on that traffic. And, uh, you know, in every case,

17. 37:52 – 40:41

    Yahoo -- Attractiveness vs Awareness

    1. JLJim Lanzone37:52

       that, that's what I've inherited.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings37:54

       Can I ask you... And this is very un-British of me.

    3. JLJim Lanzone37:56

       (laughs)

    4. HSHarry Stebbings37:57

       Um, Yahoo is a well-known brand for sure, a household name, but known, as you said with Ask Jeeves, as kind of an old school name and it's not Stripe where everyone wants to go and work and it's not sexy. Yeah, and my question is, is it just awareness that's important or does, like, attractiveness matter too?

    5. JLJim Lanzone38:21

       Okay. Well, this, this is a, uh, a great question and I think one where the answers will probably surprise some people. So look, Ask Jeeves as a brand was never gonna be fixed, to be blunt. It, it was too far down. Even when we were killing it in growth, in grow... I think we were the only search engine to gain market share. We were the only one of the 15 public company search engines that weren't the major portals to survive. But we were never gonna turn that brand around to become, you know, everybody's favorite search engine in, in the heart of, of Google. You know, Yahoo is a very different situation. It legitimately has 900 million users a month, and those users are coming, you know, in email we're number two to Gmail, in Yahoo Finance we're number one by a mile, Yahoo Sports is number two to ESPN. You know, in search, yes, we're down, but it's very valuable. And, you know, I've been there before. I think there's some (laughs) things we can do about it. Uh, in news we're number one. And, and that's after what I think we would all agree is not really the best last 10 years (laughs) , right? And, and, you know, not for reasons that were always their fault. You know, being a standalone public company for 20 plus years, um, you know, not really fighting with the best weaponry at that time (laughs) in, into the heart of Google and then Facebook and others. I mean, that was tough. Um, you know, and, and then being part of Verizon, you know, where I, I... You know, again, there's a reason why they offloaded Yahoo. It's 'cause it was not core to what they were doing, and I inherited business plans for, like, Yahoo Sports where the objective was to grow adoption of 5G, right? (laughs) Not be ESPN, not deliver great fantasy football, um, right? Or the, or the best, uh, you know, scores app, but to promote the growth of 5G. And, and so those are all things that's come through. And on the other side of that, it is still legitimately 900 million users a month. It does billions of revenue, it does billion... It, it, it is extremely profitable. If you took the name Yahoo off of this, at these growth rates and those numbers, what would you, you know, what would that be worth in this market? Especially when you realize h- how, how many companies get to 900 million users? I mean, I think there's only one every five years maybe that's created, and a lot of times they're ones that don't have great advertising, you know, models or, or environments. You know, they're communication

18. 40:41 – 41:52

    Would you change the name of Yahoo?

    1. JLJim Lanzone40:41

       platforms. It's something different.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings40:44

       Would you ever like to take the name off and put on a new name?

    3. JLJim Lanzone40:47

       No, I... Well, look, you, one thing to remember is it was just put back on. Um, you know, this company is also AOL (laughs) . So we, we also own AOL which is still very profitable and does a lot of free cash flow. So again, I look at this as, as, as what you've inherited, and, and I actually think putting the Yahoo name back on it on September 1st of last year when Apollo closed the deal was one of the luckiest things I inherited. You, you're speaking as somebody from the industry, right? And, and especially in VC or in Silicon Valley, they can be very cynical about Yahoo given the history. The average n- user of those 900 million users actually has a lot of brand preference for Yahoo. It's something we can really build off of, especially if we can do a much better job at product. There's something about it that people do love. And i- as you know, there's not always something about the big trillion dollar companies right now that ev- everybody loves. (laughs) So I actually think the first step here is, is fix the org and fix the product. But if we can do that, I think there's a lot of growth for the brand that's possible, and I think it's a strength, not a weakness,

19. 41:52 – 43:52

    #1 thing to fix in Yahoo’s organization and product

    1. JLJim Lanzone41:52

       even though I understand why you're asking the question.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings41:55

       What is the number one thing you need to fix in the org and what's the number one thing you need to fix in the product?

    3. JLJim Lanzone42:02

       So, um, I don't think there's just one or two movers here. I think the, the thesis for both Apollo and for myself is that taking these assets you'll take a lot of shots on goal. Right? You have, you, you, you have a lot of assets that are generating a lot of cash, and that allows you to invest all around the business. Some will be existing things, some will be new things. We've, we've been looking at, at acquisitions already, the, you know, the, the last nine months I've been here, and playing offense that way. So, you know, I'm not sure if, if, if you've heard this yet, but, but Yahoo is already one of the fastest returning deals in Apollo history.... we're already in the spot-

    4. HSHarry Stebbings42:40

       No, I do not.

    5. JLJim Lanzone42:40

       ... we're already in the spot where we can focus on the upside, and in a good way, we're greedy for that upside. So this is an investment opportunity, right? If Apollo and what you hear about private equity, if, if what they wanted to do was smelt this thing down for parts, they would have done it already, and they wouldn't have brought in a guy like me. They would have brought in a financial engineer, right? Not a consumer growth person. The objective here is growth. That can happen in many different ways. We're gonna take a lot of shots on goal. We don't need them all to work, um, but if we get great people, I think the majority of them can work, and, and so I do think that this is a potentially longer term play, especially as you come through a crash, and we'll be able to play offense there as well in picking up assets w- where, you know, I'm extremely optimistic. But, um, but so then to think about, you know, what we've inherited product by product, you know, the way I've reorganized the company, because what I inherited was one product team where nobody owned anything, one engineering team where nobody was dedicated really to anything, and I put general managers in place who are the CEOs of their businesses for sports and finance and email and search and, you know, every, every vertical that we have, and they're gonna drive innovation in each of those

20. 43:52 – 45:18

    How many direct reports do you have?

    1. JLJim Lanzone43:52

       categories, and then we'll add more.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings43:55

       How many direct reports do you have, Jim?

    3. JLJim Lanzone43:59

       It'll come and go. So (laughs) the-

    4. HSHarry Stebbings44:02

       (laughs)

    5. JLJim Lanzone44:02

       ... proper amount for, for my job is, is probably somewhere between 10 to 12. And over time, j- these general managers, you'll wind up with some what I, you know, refer to as, uh, you know, nickname Super GMs, where you'll have GMs who have multiple GMs reporting to them in groups or segments that make sense, 'cause this is a portfolio play. It's a con- conglomerate play. And at CBS Interactive when I inherited multiple former public companies and the CBS assets, my first thing, I was, I was like a pig in slop as a product guy, right? I was like, "Oh, I can't wait to dig in on fantasy football (laughs) and on CNET and on CBS News and Last.fm and all these things." But the reality... And so I had 25 direct reports, and I got just smacked in the face the first year trying to keep it all together. So what I really, what we, what we created was a model that we called federal and state, where you create, you know, essentially governors of each of these businesses, sometimes in groups, and you, you give them the, the operational mandate to run their own business, reporting into me, and my job is to, you know, hire and fire and manage them and work with them on their plans, and then at central or federal, you know, our job is to provide leverage, uh, you know, as cheaply as possible, right, back

21. 45:18 – 46:10

    How long do you give someone when they aren’t performing?

    1. JLJim Lanzone45:18

       into those businesses and let them run. And so-

    2. HSHarry Stebbings45:21

       How long, how long do you give people who aren't performing? That's a big question I always have.

    3. JLJim Lanzone45:26

       It depends. I- if, the more junior it is, I think the more quickly that typically moves through. I think the more senior the role is, you know, the kinda, there's, there's more reasoning and, and more, you know, work that went into putting them there, and you're probably giving them much more of a chance. So I've never put someone in a very senior role and then realized it was wrong and offed them within, you know, the first few months. I mean, you really, you really do give it due process to see and, and, and a couple, you know, turns to, to see how they react. Um, again, I wouldn't say there's a hard fast rule for that. But, you know, another way of looking at it is it's, it's not that long, right? (laughs) I mean, if it's not working, it's not working,

22. 46:10 – 47:40

    What’s your biggest weakness as a leader?

    1. JLJim Lanzone46:10

       uh, which means they're probably, they're probably miserable too.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings46:13

       Can I ask you, Jim, when I listen to you, you're so assured in your leadership. Everyone says what a brilliant leader you are. You know yourself better than anyone. Where do you think your biggest holes in your leadership are?

    3. JLJim Lanzone46:26

       Oh, you know, it, it, it's probably changed over time is what I would say. So, um, you know, in the old days, it was, is, you know, when I started, I came out of grad school. I, I wasn't an engineer. I wasn't technical, and I, you know, all on the way have had to learn the job from that side of things, right, not from the engineering side of things. I'm also, by the way, not a CFO, right? I could, I could pretty much drop down to do most people's jobs (laughs) in the company, but, you know, in some ways, even the CTO at this point, although engineers would laugh at me. I'm not, I'm not saying I'm, I'm that technical by any means. (laughs) I just mean operationally what the lever pulling is for that job. CFO is not one where you would put me. Um, again, I've had CFOs now for 20 plus years and, uh, you know, I'm really lucky with, uh, Monica, my current CFO, is amazing and, you know, my, my CFOs at all my last companies have just really been great. I need that person to be a really strong partner to me. Uh, so, you know, no, (laughs) you gotta know what you're good at and what, what you're not and where you add value and where the team-

    4. HSHarry Stebbings47:36

       Jim-

    5. JLJim Lanzone47:36

       ... can balance you out.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings47:37

       Jim, I'm a VC and I can't count, so have no fear about

23. 47:40 – 49:59

    What gets easier and harder over time as a leader?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings47:40

       that. Final, final one then before a quick fire-

    2. JLJim Lanzone47:42

       (laughs)

    3. HSHarry Stebbings47:42

       ... and it's just in leadership, people often say, "Oh, it, you know, it never gets easier." I, I'd love to know, what gets easier over time and what gets harder over time?

    4. JLJim Lanzone47:54

       Yeah, a few things. So easier, hiring for sure. You know, you get better at it as you, as you go along. Your, your, your success rate gets higher. Uh, the systems that you rely on in a company and, and having the confidence, you've heard me say many times today, you know, um, where I, I do or don't believe in a hard fast rule. But, you know, look, I know the way I want to structure an organization. I know what a planning process should look like, how to use data to make decisions, how to run an offsite, (laughs) how to cut red tape. You know, what, w- what looks like something that's red tape that you should cut (laughs) and have pattern recognition, you know, across things. You know, that all gets easier. Um, and then the last thing is just the confidence to take risks. I mean, I've always had that. I think that's always come naturally to me. But the more you go along, the more confident you are about that. And again, I want to say, very specific to this industry, right? You put me running a chemical company or a fashion company, you know, I probably wouldn't know all these things, right? I'd have to start over. Um, so-

    5. HSHarry Stebbings48:55

       What gets harder?

    6. JLJim Lanzone48:57

       Yeah, I think it's natural the more you go along to want more and more independence. And at the end of the day though, you're- everybody's gotta serve somebody, right? Bob Dylan said it. (laughs) And it could be your board, it could be shareholders, it could be your VCs. In a lot of ways, it's your own company and, and your employees. Especially now, you know, companies are, are very active, um, and, and have been through a lot, uh, the past couple years. (laughs) And, and so, you know, you're never truly independent. Uh, and then the second is that, you know, I just say winning is always hard, right? That's why it's, you know, so few companies win. You never hear about the 900 companies that didn't make it, you only hear about the ones that did, so it seems like the success rate is really high. But the truth is, this is a high-wire act and not everybody makes it. Um, and it's, it's always gonna be hard, no matter what.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings49:50

       Jim, I could talk to you all day but I am aware we've completely ruined the 20-minute VC version.

    8. JLJim Lanzone49:54

       (laughs)

    9. HSHarry Stebbings49:54

       But, uh, we will move into a quick fire round. So I say a short statement and you give me your immediate thoughts.

24. 49:59 – 51:03

    Favorite book and why?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings49:59

       Does that sound okay?

    2. JLJim Lanzone50:01

       We can do it. Let's do it.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings50:02

       Okay. So what's the favorite book, and why, Jim?

    4. JLJim Lanzone50:05

       Oh, that's tough. Um, okay, so 'cause you have to understand, I actually used to work at a bookstore, uh, dur- (laughs) right out of college for a few months. I love, I love books. So I'd say this, my favorite management book is Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin, and my favorite entrepreneurship book is Shoe Dog by Phil Knight, the story of Nike's founding.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings50:25

       That's fanta- ... I've never had Team of Rivals suggested on the show before. Uh, I will, I will get it and-

    6. JLJim Lanzone50:29

       I think it's the best management book you could, you could possibly read.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings50:33

       Why?

    8. JLJim Lanzone50:34

       Multiple things. I mean, I think, I think it's about, uh, putting the team before yourself. I think it's about getting a team of, of, you know, of experts who are great at their jobs, who, you know, don't necessarily all, uh, fit together in an obvious way, but getting them to work as a team. And as the leader of that group, you know, what does that mean to be the hub leader, you know, the quarterback for a team like that, in the hardest of possible circumstances.

25. 51:03 – 52:35

    Hardest element of role with Yahoo

    1. JLJim Lanzone51:03

       Yeah, you'll, you'll never find a better book, in my opinion, on leadership. (laughs)

    2. HSHarry Stebbings51:07

       What's the hardest element of your role with Yahoo today?

    3. JLJim Lanzone51:10

       Just changing the mindset of people takes a lot of time. Uh, some of my team will laugh if they'll, if they hear me say this, but I've, I've said a few times, "I wish you could have been with me at prior companies to understand what this looks like and how it goes well (laughs) and, and how you're gonna feel and, and, and why we won and, and how great it was to be part of that team." You know, every time you do this, you're starting over. It's not as easy as Eleven in Stranger Things, being able to go back in the past and, and (laughs) you know, see, see back, you know, put your finger on someone's forehead and, and see what it was like. You know, you, they kinda have to live that experience, and it's, it's hard to be patient all the time to, to bring a new team along to that. You just have to have faith you'll get there.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings51:53

       If you could be CEO of any other company, which company would it be?

    5. JLJim Lanzone51:59

       Well, caveat. I, I, I signed up for this one, I'm gonna be here quite a while. So, um, this is gonna, this is a really big one, and, uh, there's no other company I'm longing to go run. For a long time, you know, Twitter was that company for me, that's always been my white whale. (laughs) You know, I, I love the product but I, I always felt it could have been a lot more than it, it was. Uh, and, and so I've, I always, you know, look side-eye at, at, at Twitter as the, the one that, that got away.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings52:28

       I'll introduce you to my mate Elon. (laughs)

    7. JLJim Lanzone52:31

       (laughs)

    8. HSHarry Stebbings52:32

       Uh, no idea wh- n- no idea when that-

    9. JLJim Lanzone52:33

       Well, it's gonna be a whole different situation

26. 52:35 – 53:35

    Three traits you’d most like your children to adopt

    1. JLJim Lanzone52:35

       at th- at this point, and, and I'm, I'm spoken for. (laughs)

    2. HSHarry Stebbings52:38

       What, what three traits would you most like your children to adopt?

    3. JLJim Lanzone52:44

       Oh, wow. Um. Well, I'd say sense of humor. I think my wife would kill me if I didn't say that one.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings52:53

       (laughs)

    5. JLJim Lanzone52:53

       She'd, she'd, she'd say they better be, they better be fricking funny.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings52:56

       (laughs)

    7. JLJim Lanzone52:57

       Uh, (laughs) hunger. You know, have a, like a, n- not like a business hunger, but just always be hungry for the next experience or milestone or album to listen to or place to visit, you know? I, the last thing I ever wanna hear is my kids saying that, that they're bored. Um, I, I, I, I look at this as we're s- you know, we're stuck in this rock floating in space, (laughs) you know, millions of light years from the next closest rock. Which is why I don't understand why Elon wants to focus on Mars. It's like, well, where are you gonna go next? There's not that many places.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings53:27

       (laughs)

    9. JLJim Lanzone53:28

       Uh, we gotta fix this place. Uh, so then, so then the last one's just I just hope that they're joyful, you know, they find their bliss and that they

27. 53:35 – 54:33

    What do you know now that you wish you’d known at the start?

    1. JLJim Lanzone53:35

       enjoy their time on this, this floating rock, here in space. (laughs)

    2. HSHarry Stebbings53:38

       What do you know now that you wish you'd known way back in 1999 with the first company? What would you tell yourself when you were starting out in this business?

    3. JLJim Lanzone53:49

       Uh, well, I'd go back further, to 1993 when I graduated UCLA, and I would've just said, "Just go get a job at an internet company and just (laughs) trust that you're gonna be good at it." 'Cause I, I didn't know what I wanted to do. You know, my dad was a small town lawyer, you know, not a big corporate lawyer. My mom was a teacher at my high school. I just didn't have any background in, in business. And, uh, so I went to law school and, you know, and I met my wife there, which is the best thing. And we've been married for 25 years, which makes it even weirder that I ran Tw- Tinder for that period of time, 'cause I was the last person who was ever gonna use it. But, um, yeah, I would've, I, I would've just gone back to that point in time and just shoved me straight into Yahoo at, at the beginning instead of, you know, the way it turned out. But, you know, life, life finds

28. 54:33 – 56:06

    What are the keys to a successful marriage?

    1. JLJim Lanzone54:33

       a way, right?

    2. HSHarry Stebbings54:34

       Penultimate one for you, which is off-script, but you mentioned the incredible relationship you have with your wife. What are the ultimate foundations-

    3. JLJim Lanzone54:41

       Yeah.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings54:41

       ... of a truly successful marriage?

    5. JLJim Lanzone54:46

       Well, by the way, did you know that Tinder is the number one source of marriages in the United States?

    6. HSHarry Stebbings54:52

       I did not.

    7. JLJim Lanzone54:52

       It's over 10% of all marriages come from Tinder, which is different than its reputation. And, um-And I've, I've seen it. My daughter met her girlfriend on Tinder and they'd been together for eight months. (laughs) They're extremely happy. That happened after I left, by the way.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings55:06

       Wow.

    9. JLJim Lanzone55:07

       Um, yeah. You know, I, I'd say my wife and I, and I think all of our friends would tell you this, are best friends who crack each other up and, uh, are never bored together. And we've been together 28 years, that we've been, you know, at least living together. And, uh, you know, we just keep each other on our toes. Um, you know, I, I, I think I always wanted that. I wanted (laughs) somebody who kept me on my toes and always made me, you know, keep trying, working really hard for it. And, uh, and so if you have all that and it's, it's romantic at the same time, like, that's the, that's the combo.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings55:44

        Oh God, that sounds exhausting. (laughs)

    11. JLJim Lanzone55:48

        No.

    12. HSHarry Stebbings55:49

        No, I, I-

    13. JLJim Lanzone55:49

        It's, it's the opposite. It actually should be the easiest thing possible. And, and by the way, the person who falls for you will be for reasons you don't even know. Like, people who try too hard, they're not putting the right version of themselves out there anyway.

    14. HSHarry Stebbings56:03

        Hmm. You should be a love coach, Jim. There we go.

29. 56:06 – 57:36

    What do the next 5 years look like for you and Yahoo?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings56:06

       We could, we could do a wee-

    2. JLJim Lanzone56:07

       (laughs)

    3. HSHarry Stebbings56:07

       ... a weekly session. Uh, final one.

    4. JLJim Lanzone56:10

       (laughs)

    5. HSHarry Stebbings56:10

       What are the next five years for you and for Yahoo? If we have this conversation in 2027, where would you like to be?

    6. JLJim Lanzone56:18

       Well, I, I think the ideal is that we're a public company again, that we've spent this time as a private company and, and now with the market being very, very different than six months ago, let alone the last 13 years, that we have the ability to retrench off, you know, off the, uh, off the radar a little bit and can build this thing up the right way, make the changes we need to make, you know, whether that's acquiring, or selling, or what, you know, whatever we're gonna do, and come out the other side of that as a company that, that really can think long-term about being a public company again. You know, not in a position where you're trying to make quarters and do unholy things to, to do it. Um, you know, that, that's the, that's the optimal for where we wanna take, take Yahoo. But again, there's, there's so much coming up here, right? And, uh, and, and again, it's, it's, it, it's, um, I think about this quarter by quarter right now. You can't, can't think that far ahead just yet.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings57:15

       Jim, I cannot thank you enough for putting up with my incredibly wayward questions. I cannot thank you enough for putting up with my fedora, uh, and your sensitivity there. Uh, but this has been so much fun and I, I really did so enjoy it.

    8. JLJim Lanzone57:27

       All right, Hari. It's so good to see you. Keep rocking the fedora.

Episode duration: 57:36