Ken Norton, Yahoo’s senior director of product management at Yahoo! Inc., and co-founder of Grand Central Communications, one of my favorite companies, is jumping ship to JotSpot. Reason? In his own words: “I wanted a place where things get done with small teams of hungry, dedicated people. Companies where decisions are made not by steering committees, but by walking across the street to get coffee.” Despite their Silicon Valley locations, all not new anymore economy companies like Yahoo, Ebay, even Google are not as nimble as they would like us to believe. Still Ken Norton’s “public resignation” today, and Lenn Pryor’s earlier move to Skype announced via a similar missive, is giving a new meaning to the phrase, “exit interview.”
5 comments so far
8:34 AM PT
Would be interested to know why GC is a favorite company.
8:42 AM PT
i said one of my favorite companies. actually if you can find the damn archives at red herring, you can find out why.
2:31 PM PT
The reason he is leaving is Semel’s $231M take-home for ‘04.
Because it is one thing if a true wealth-creator knows (s)he is getting screwed. It is entirely another thing if other people know, because then the screwee looks like a moron if (s)he just sits there and takes it.
Look for the exodus of true stars from Yahoo to continue, just as sharp MSFTies are leaving en masse in the immediate aftermath of massive insider selling by top mgmt…
11:11 PM PT
I’m finding that blogs are pretty good for entry interviews as well. :-)
6:48 AM PT
quite right - forgot about that. russell and many others have gotten their gigs via blogs. welll thanks for the reminder
Leave a Comment