Steve Ballmer's Big-Time Error: Not Resigning Years Ago


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Any number of executives could take Ballmer's place, including a few he unceremoniously kicked to the curb over the years. Whoever steps into that CEO role, however, faces a much greater challenge than if Ballmer had quietly resigned several years ago. Ballmer famously missed the boat on tablets and smartphones; Windows 8 isn't selling as well as Microsoft expected; and on Websites and blogs such as Mini-Microsoft (which had a brilliant posting about Ballmer's departure), employees complain bitterly about the company's much-maligned stack-ranking system, its layers of bureaucracy, and its inability to innovate. Had Ballmer left years ago, replaced by someone with the ability to more keenly anticipate markets, the company would probably be in much better shape to face its coming challenges. In its current form, Microsoft often feels like it's struggling in the wake of Amazon, Google, Apple, and Facebook.

 

 

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Good riddance Stevo.

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Yay more of this drivel.

 

Win8 is selling just fine (by comparisons to how Win7 sold after this timeframe).

 

MS are in a very strong position.  Under Ballmer they have become players in the mobile and tablet market - so to one end those products are a success.

 

I love the amount of uninformed hate and emotional attachment to a CEO of a company.  It's something only absolute geeks would ever do.  Moreover, the way that they all become armchair pundits is astounding.  Talking stocks and shares like they know a thing - when they are just reposting the same old tired nonsense other bloggers have ranted about.

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Yay more of this drivel.

 

Win8 is selling just fine (by comparisons to how Win7 sold after this timeframe).

 

MS are in a very strong position.  Under Ballmer they have become players in the mobile and tablet market - so to one end those products are a success.

 

I love the amount of uninformed hate and emotional attachment to a CEO of a company.  It's something only absolute geeks would ever do.  Moreover, the way that they all become armchair pundits is astounding.  Talking stocks and shares like they know a thing - when they are just reposting the same old tired nonsense other bloggers have ranted about.

 

QFT.

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You don't see CEOs of companies that are in good position resigning! 

 

Utter utter nonsense.  As said in the main thread, my father did it twice, on the basis that he had taken the company from nothing through to success in every measurable manner, and wanted to do something new.

 

Again, the voice of a poster who clearly knows not what he is talking about.

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Any number of executives could take Ballmer's place, including a few he unceremoniously kicked to the curb over the years. Whoever steps into that CEO role, however, faces a much greater challenge than if Ballmer had quietly resigned several years ago. Ballmer famously missed the boat on tablets and smartphones; Windows 8 isn't selling as well as Microsoft expected; and on Websites and blogs such as Mini-Microsoft (which had a brilliant posting about Ballmer's departure), employees complain bitterly about the company's much-maligned stack-ranking system, its layers of bureaucracy, and its inability to innovate. Had Ballmer left years ago, replaced by someone with the ability to more keenly anticipate markets, the company would probably be in much better shape to face its coming challenges. In its current form, Microsoft often feels like it's struggling in the wake of Amazon, Google, Apple, and Facebook.

 

 

steve-ballmer-580.jpeg

 

 

Good riddance Stevo.

Oh? Practicing your hindsight?

 

Castigating someone for a supposedly-bad decision ALWAYS looks good in hindsight - that is simply due to hindsight ALWAYS being twenty-twenty.  (Ask anyone that has ever been leader of a country - any country - no matter how they got there.)  The issue, whether it's the leader of a company OR a country, is the basis OF the decision-making - whether good OR bad.

 

The big reason Ballmer has been getting whacked is because he actually dared to make risky decisions - even those that eventually worked out (such as the codebase change that resulted in the overlong overhang between XP and Vista) took longer to work out, but DID work out - that code change resulted in Windows 7/Windows Server 2008, and their successors.  But we, as consumers, are getting less and less in favor of taking ANY sort of risk.  Despite all the praise heaped on lately on Apple (and even Google) for taking less risk, what changes BOTH have made have been getting attacked.  Being cowardly is not always the best strategy - in fact, it's seldom even a good strategy, even in business, let along geopolitics.  (Otherwise, why is current Apple CEO Tim Cook getting his own share of whacking - from Apple investors - for his heavily risk-averse strategem at Apple?)  Taking risks is part of the job description of a CEO - a CEO of a company is the person that executes the company's strategem.  (While the company's chairperson is the representative of the most powerful shareholder, in most larger companies, the chairman is NOT also the CEO; remember, it was Bill Gates that split the two apart at Microsoft, and he didn't even make the CEO decision himself, though he DID recommend Ballmer.)

 

Hating the decision of the CEO of a company - any company - is one thing - but is it the decision itself that you hate, or the process that led to that decision?  Ballmer is very much a prickly pear - that's not news, or at least it shouldn't be.  However, all of those picks by other Neowinians to replace Ballmer - and especially Steven Elop at Nokia - have been at least as prickly as Ballmer at some point.  While corporate CEOs have been more public - and especially since the breakup of the conglomerates started in the 1970s - they are still the executors of the overall corporate strategy - including being Honorable Hatchet Person when necessary.  (That has been true of "good" and "bad" CEOs - including Ballmer, Elop, and the last three CEOs at HP - Meg Whitman (currently), Mark Hurd (her immediate predecessor, now at Oracle), and Carly Fiorina (who Hurd replaced).  In fact, compare Mark Hurd directly to Carly Fiorina - which was the better CEO of HP?)

 

In fact, look at Jack Welch - the (in)famous former CEO of GE.  He's infamous for laying off more folks than all the other CEOs over GE's entire history - put together.  Yet Welch is also thought of - not just inside GE, but outside of GE - as the greatest CEO that GE has EVER had.  (And considering that GE was founded by Thomas Edison, who was also GE's first CEO, that's a downright bold statement.)  While a CEO of a large company is often the company's public face - blame Lee Iacocca - don't go thinking that they are necessarily going to be "nice".  (In fact, Iacocca himself, historically, was pricklier in his corporate career than even Ballmer.)

 

I don't always agree with Ballmer's decisions - however, he's been right FAR more than he's been wrong.

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You don't see CEOs of companies that are in good position resigning!

 

bill gates was 6 years younger than ballmer is resigned as chairman,and stepped down as CEO in 2000. what bad position was he in?

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I think the main point here is seing that MS employes feel relieved (and even satisfied) to watch Ballmer leave. It's quite unfortunate in a company to see these kind of feelings about their own CEO.

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Utter utter nonsense. As said in the main thread, my father did it twice, on the basis that he had taken the company from nothing through to success in every measurable manner, and wanted to do something new.

Again, the voice of a poster who clearly knows not what he is talking about.

And you just used the example of your father when we are talking about a multi billion dollar company? Nice try but no.

Microsoft has not established themselves in Windows Phone or in Tablets yet. They had a huge fiasco with Xbox One and with Windows 8. There is still lots of work left to do to correct those mistakes and take the company further. So clearly it's not a good time for CEO of the company to retire as he did NOT leave Microsoft in as good of a position as you clueless fanboys like to think.

And on top of that the stock surged on the news of him leaving.

So like I said, nice try but simply no.

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Utter utter nonsense.  As said in the main thread, my father did it twice, on the basis that he had taken the company from nothing through to success in every measurable manner, and wanted to do something new.

 

Again, the voice of a poster who clearly knows not what he is talking about.

In fact, Jack Welch resigned (in fact, he RETIRED) as GE CEO, despite two requests from his own board - in public, no less - that he stay on.

 

True - it's darn rare that a corporate CEO resigns OR retires on good terms (I can't think of an HP CEO that has done so in my lifetime, for example), and especially lately - however, it DOES happen.

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And you just used the example of your father when we are talking about a multi billion dollar company? Nice try but no.

Microsoft has not established themselves in Windows Phone or in Tablets yet. They had a huge fiasco with Xbox One and with Windows 8. There is still lots of work left to do to correct those mistakes and take the company further. So clearly it's not a good time for CEO of the company to retire as he did NOT leave Microsoft in as good of a position as you clueless fanboys like to think.

And on top of that the stock surged on the news of him leaving.

So like I said, nice try but simply no.

Quit with the namecalling. Microsoft is in better position in the mobile market than it was when Windows 7 was released. They now have Nokia, Skype, and Surface. They have a great deal of cards to play, that no other company has. Windows 8 is far from a fiasco - It's working great to unify their systems, and yes, they made a few mistakes with XBO, however have since corrected them.

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And you just used the example of your father when we are talking about a multi billion dollar company? Nice try but no. 

 

Multi-billion? No.  Multi-million? Yes.  Please explain where you made the clarification in your original post?

 

Microsoft has not established themselves in Windows Phone or in Tablets yet.

 

They are the 3rd player in the mobile market.  The Surface (from what I have both read and seen in use) has taken of pretty well here - and certainly they are a player.

 

They had a huge fiasco with Xbox One and with Windows 8

 

And there you show your colours.  These "fiasco's" were created by the clueless fanboys you seem so willing to cite.  Well done.

 

And on top of that the stock surged on the news of him leaving. 

 

Of course it did.  Wow, you know VERY little of the stock market don't you.  They are a publicly floated company.  Therein leis the problem of voices from the uninformed such as yourself - it makes a huge difference whether it is right or wrong.  Perception plays a part when it really should not.

 

MS are in the strongest position they have been in for about a decade.  A great portfolio with some emerging opportunities.  Some awesome figures to back that up.

 

Nice try but if all your are going to base your argument on is perception, then you already lost.  Feel free to show me how their profits are on the fall... Oh wait, you can't.

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Windows 8 is not selling fine. Ballmer had predicted last year they'd sell 350-400 million licenses in the first year. Right now it's not even on pace to sell 50% of that. That's ignoring the other issues of Windows 8(bifurcated UI, ugly flat tiles, garish color choices, confusing lack of visual cues and lack of good tablet apps).

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Multi-billion? No.  Multi-million? Yes.  Please explain where you made the clarification in your original post?

 

 

Last time I checked, microsoft was a multi-billion dollar company.  Think we misunderstood ourselves here.

 

They are the 3rd player in the mobile market.  The Surface (from what I have both read and seen in use) has taken of pretty well here - and certainly they are a player.

 

 

Surface is a failure.  How many 3rd party manufacturers stopped making tables based on Windows RT?  And did you forget about the write down on the Surface?  FAIL!

 

And there you show your colours.  These "fiasco's" were created by the clueless fanboys you seem so willing to cite.  Well done.

 

So what's the reason Microsoft did so many U-Turns with the xbox one?  It's because the amount of people that complained greatly exceeds the amount of fanboys.

 

Of course it did.  Wow, you know VERY little of the stock market don't you.  They are a publicly floated company.  Therein leis the problem of voices from the uninformed such as yourself - it makes a huge difference whether it is right or wrong.  Perception plays a part when it really should not.

 

 

I know a lot about stock market.  And the market reacted positively to the news of a CEO that is retiring, as it did with so many other companies.  Do some research please.

 

MS are in the strongest position they have been in for about a decade.  A great portfolio with some emerging opportunities.  Some awesome figures to back that up.

 

Nice try but if all your are going to base your argument on is perception, then you already lost.  Feel free to show me how their profits are on the fall... Oh wait, you can't.

 

 

They aren't in the strongest position, they wanted to be but their CEO failed to get them there.  So now it's out with him and in with someone who can turn this company for the better.

 

And I never made an argument that Microsoft is a failing company.  On the contrary they are still fairly strong at what they do but just not where they could/should be.  Balmer didn't exactly fail at his job but he also didn't excel.  And so it's time to replace him with someone else.  It's just business people, no reason to get all worked up about it.

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Win 8 is selling exactly as well as Win 7 did in the same timeframe.

 

Pretty much.  Now what's the price difference in Windows 8 vs Windows 7 when it was released?  

 

And where is the growth?

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And where is the growth?

 

The growth is within the other sectors as it stands.

The growth is that they have adopted the price difference (at launch, not any more)

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Windows 8 is not selling fine. Ballmer had predicted last year they'd sell 350-400 million licenses in the first year. Right now it's not even on pace to sell 50% of that. That's ignoring the other issues of Windows 8(bifurcated UI, ugly flat tiles, garish color choices, confusing lack of visual cues and lack of good tablet apps).

 

Bifurcated UI! Nice parroting skills.

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Another Win 8 trollish topic. Time to cease this one before lots of warns are handed out....

 

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