It may come as no surprise that turning Yahoo around was bound to be a tough job. But company CEO, Carol Bartz, says its been tougher than even she expected.
Bartz tells Bloomberg News that if she were she to get a grade for her first year, it should be a B-minus.
Marking her fist year next week, Bartz tells the publication, "It was a little tougher internally than I think I had anticipated. I did move fast, but this is a big job."
The company chairman, Roy Bostock, gives Bartz an A-minus for her first year, but his assistant told Bloomberg he couldn't comment further.
After she took over the company from Jerry Yang, Bartz had to cut staff and shut down partnerships that weren't performing well. But, since then, it's been on the rebound.
"We came out of one of the worst climates ever," Bartz, who ran Autodesk before moving over to Yahoo, told Bloomberg. "And if you look at growth of Fortune 500 companies, only being down 12 or 15 percent is damn good. I’m not going to apologize for our growth."
Product improvement and ramped-up acquisitions are on the horizon for the Sunnyvale-based Internet giant, the 61-year-old CEO says.
"You're just going to see Yahoo bloom more," she said.
