“Yes, Keep Moving”: Marissa Mayer’s First Memo to Yahoos (Natch!)

While I might abandon my internal memo-quest at Yahoo at some point soon, I wanted to make sure to post the very first one from newly installed — and well-paid — CEO Marissa Mayer.

“You are doing important work — please don’t stop,” the former Google exec wrote to her new flock of employees in a missive sent yesterday. “Yes, keep moving!”

I took that to heart in tracking down this do-not-forward-oops memo — which I changed around a bit to thwart those who try to stop me from getting these emails via tricky computer programs — so enjoy.

Update: After getting questions, let me clarify: I only changed punctuation, such as “it’s” to “it is” or adding or subtracting a comma, but no text was altered and no sentences were moved or removed. I would never do such a thing, but I should have been more clear. Sorry!

Privileged and confidential — Do not forward Dear Yahoos! I couldn’t be more excited to be here — thank you for the warm welcome over the past two days! I can’t wait to get to know more about Yahoo’s products, culture, and all of you. I’ve always had a deep respect for Yahoo! — I first experienced it as a student at Stanford in 1994 as “David and Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web” — and I’ve been fan ever since. I’m incredibly honored to now be a part of the team and work with all of you. Yahoo! is an Internet icon — in terms of brand, reach, user following, in its products and service. There is an enormous amount of opportunity in front of us. The company has been through a lot of change in the past few months, leaving many open questions around strategy and how to move forward. I am sensitive to this. While I have some ideas, I need to develop a more informed perspective before making strategy or direction changes. In the meantime, please do not stop. You are doing important work. Please don’t stop. If you have questions or concerns about whether to continue or not, please ask. However, with the exception of a few things that might heavily constrain us in the future, the answer is most likely: “Yes, keep moving.” Companies are all about people and the companies with the best talent win. Joining was an easy decision, because the strength of Yahoo!’s talent and the whole team here is apparent. We will continue to invest in talent, so we can produce the most compelling and exciting user experiences anywhere. In recognizing our team’s deep talent, we all owe thanks to Ross Levinsohn, for his leadership and direction as interim CEO over the last couple of months. Ross has done a terrific job for the company. Looking forward, we need to continue Yahoo!’s tradition of bold innovation, encourage creativity, and ultimately inspire and delight users and advertisers. Please come by my office in building D on the third floor and say hello. I cannot wait to hear your ideas for Yahoo!’s future. Marissa

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.