I'm taking a class with Alyson Curtis of AARP on the Elements of Communication Planning. Here is one the posts I wrote for the course:
After Marissa Mayer posed (in a very classy, IMHO) photo shoot
for Vogue magazine,
she received a combination of praise and criticism. Criticism, interestingly
enough, was frequently lobbed at her by colleagues
in the tech industry who felt that a person in her position "diminishes...
[her] chances
for future success by damaging [her] qualification and suitability in the
public eye."
At the Interactive Advertising Bureau conference, Marissa spoke with Charlie Rose regarding her strategy at Yahoo. Towards the end of her
segment, the conversation evolved to include gender and leadership, where he
asked her "Will we see Larry Page on the cover of Vogue?"
Of course, Larry Page is one of the co-founders of Google and would probably
not look as fabulous in a cobalt blue sheath dress (although I'm willing to be
proved wrong).
 |
| please don't put him in a blue dress, i was kidding. |
At this point, Marissa seemed "clearly
embarrassed," and stammered out excuses for her first pass at modeling,
claiming that the photographer convinced her to pose like that "out of
necessity."
What's clear here is that Marissa's brand is in limbo - is
she the self-proclaimed geek whose technological prowess will bring back from
the ether a formerly great? Or is she a savvy, strong, and yes - stylish - CEO
whose confidence and acumen will invigorate the renaissance of Yahoo?
Whatever combination of the two they present is up to
Marissa and her team, but I feel that she should have stood by her Vogue shoot.
There was nothing scandalous about the photo, and I believe that what the
article said should bear more weight than the accompanying picture anyway. Even
if she didn't love how the feature turned out, no CEO or coder should feel
compelled to apologize for a situation where they did nothing wrong. Marissa
has a lot at stake in appearing confident. After all, how can she inspire
confidence in her investors when she can't inspire confident in herself?
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