雅虎，你够了！

    公司与维权股东的争执通常都没有恶意，比如美国在线（AOL）。当然，雅虎与美国在线不同，但从上世纪90年代的巅峰时期之后，两家公司都失去了发展的动力，并且一直在努力从很有前景的资产中挖掘价值。2011年，美国在线接受了激进的对冲基金Starboard Value，目前该基金持有美国在线5.3%的流通股。公司与对冲基金曾就公司领导策略问题公开争执，但最后美国在线努力保证这种争论能够做到心平气和，甚至推动了公司的发展：从今年年初以来，美国在线的股价已经上涨了70%，达到了每股26美元。

    当然，美国在线的问题并没有完全解决。蒂姆•阿姆斯特朗仍面临着巨大的压力，他必须想办法实现他所提出的复兴策略，其中包括将公司转变为高质量内容生产商。但与雅虎和第三点公司的激烈交火不同，虽然美国在线与Starboard之间仍存在分歧，但两者之间只是在进行严肃的讨论而已。

    雅虎不得不继续寻找CEO人选，这对于股东而言并非好事。代理CEO列文森在发给雅虎员工的备忘录中提到汤普森辞职的事：“……今天的公告内容可以简单地总结为：此次事件之后，从去年8月开始的董事会的一系列变动到此终于画上了句号。”让我们期待雅虎为稳定董事会做出的努力能够减少雅虎所有决策中的隐患，特别是考虑到目前雅虎的决策并不够彻底。雅虎在上周日发布的公告之外不愿发表任何评论。

    CEO不一定要成为改革者，与对冲基金合作也不应该变成相互谩骂。雅虎，我们相信你能够平息争执，做出正确的选择，也不要再惊吓自己的员工了。我们讨论的是公司的复兴，而不是一场窝里斗。

    译者：阿龙/汪皓

    Companies spar with activist investors all the time without as much spite. Take AOL (AOL). Yahoo and AOL are different, no doubt, but both have lost steam since their 1990s halcyon days and are trying to glean value from their many promising assets. In 2011, AOL took on activist hedge fund Starboard Value, which now owns 5.3% of AOL's outstanding shares. The company and the hedge fund have publicly gone back and forth over the company's leadership strategy, yet AOL has somehow managed to handle the discussion quietly, and has even thrived from it: AOL's share price has increased by 70% to about $26 per-share since the beginning of the year.

    AOL certainly still has its problems. The pressure is on for CEO Tim Armstrong to pull off a tricky turnaround strategy that involves changing the company into a high-quality content generator. But flaws aside, AOL's relationship with Starboard has looked like a stern discussion compared to Yahoo's firefight.

    Unfortunately for shareholders, Yahoo must go on the CEO search yet again. In a memo to Yahoo employees, interim CEO Levinsohn said of Thompson leaving the company, "....today's announcements really boil down to this: following these changes, a transformation and renewal at the Board level that began in August of last year is now complete." Let's hope that stabilizing the board will take some of the sting out of every decision Yahoo makes, especially given that the decisions themselves aren't that radical. Yahoo declined to comment beyond the statement it issued Sunday.

    A CEO doesn't necessarily need to be a crusader, and working with a hedge fund doesn't have to degenerate into name-calling. You might do well, Yahoo, to settle down, make some choices, and stop scaring the crap out of your employees. This is a corporate turnaround, not a cage match.