A reorg, in seven easy steps

I think I may have to give Michael Arrington some credit, for sticking to his guns after an indirect slam from Terry Semel. The Techcrunch publisher acknowledges upfront that the tech news site's report — that Yahoo's Terry Semel was to give way to Sue Decker and Dan Rosensweig, and announce layoffs at the internet media company — didn't pan out. But Arrington says that was indeed the plan. And his explanation is credible. So here, after the jump, is the easy-to-follow illustrated scenario:

1. Terry Semel does indeed plan to step back, to a chairman role, or down.

2. He offers CFO Sue Decker and COO Dan Rosensweig the two key operating roles.

3. Although the offer to Rosensweig is sweetened by calling the position co-CEO, Rosensweig feels he'd be ceding too much power to Decker. Rosensweig had run the company, day-to-day.

4. Farzad Nazem's role is amped up, because Yahoo needs to show a deeper management bench, and Wall Street doesn't know enough about the CTO to question his prominence in the reshuffle.

5. Yahoo's already told people management changes are afoot, so it goes ahead anyway. That would help explain why Semel pulled back from an interview with the Wall Street Journal: the company was still probably scrambling to work out the details of the announcement.

6. Semel announces Decker's promotion, Rosensweig's resignation, and, slightly embarrassing, a search for an executive to take the role that would have been filled by Rosensweig.

7. With so much uncertainty over Yahoo's senior management, still unresolved, it would be too damaging to fragile staff morale also to announce 20% layoffs. And the holidays are coming up

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Republished from http://valleywag.gawker.com