硅谷男權文化 雅虎女掌門的性別之累

“I’m a dirty old man and you look attractive, Marissa.” They were the words that greeted Marissa Mayer, Yahoo’s chief executive, during her first annual shareholder meeting, when a man named George Polis took the microphone to ask about dividends.

“我有點老不正經，你看起來很有魅力，瑪麗薩。”雅虎(Yahoo)首席執行官瑪麗薩•邁耶(Marissa Mayer)首次主持股東年會時，一個名爲喬治•波利斯(George Polis)的男子拿過話筒向她說道，他是想詢問有關股息的事。

Ignoring the statement, Ms Mayer deputed an executive to respond to Mr Polis’s query on dividends. The strategy has been consistent throughout her leadership of one of the world’s most famous companies. She has often avoided questions about Silicon Valley’s male-dominated culture. “I never play the gender card,” she told a reporter in 2015. “The moment you play into that, it’s an issue.”

邁耶不理這句話，讓一名高管回答了波利斯所提的股息問題。在她執掌全球最著名公司之一雅虎期間，她始終貫徹着這條策略。她常常回避有關硅谷男權文化的問題。“我從不打性別牌，”她在2015年曾對一名記者說，“一旦你牽涉其中，它就成了問題。”

That changed this week when Ms Mayer made a rare complaint about “gender-charged” reporting in an interview with the Financial Times. “I’ve tried to be gender-blind and believe tech is a gender-neutral zone but do think there has been gender-charged reporting,” she said.

但本週接受英國《金融時報》(Financial Times)採訪時，她罕見地抱怨了那些“性別色彩濃厚”的報道。她說：“我曾經努力無視性別，並相信科技是不帶有性別色彩的領域，但我的確認爲存在性別色彩濃厚的報道。”

She cited articles focused on appearance as one topic that plagues only female leaders. “I think all women are aware of that but I had hoped in 2015 and 2016 that I would see fewer articles like that. It’s a shame.”

她提到一些文章對女性領導人評頭論足。“我認爲所有女性都知道這一點，但我曾在2015年和2016年希望這樣的文章會少一些。這是一個恥辱。”

She has also faced a stream of stories that would not have been written about a male chief executive, on subjects such as her childcare arrangements, themed holiday parties, dating history and home decor.

還有一系列報道針對她的幼兒保育安排、假日主題派對、感情交往史以及家居裝飾——如果是男性首席執行官，媒體一般不會拿這些做文章。

The gender issue was clear from her first day as Yahoo chief executive in 2012, when some argued that the fact she was several months pregnant meant she would not be up to the job. When she took just two weeks of maternity leave, she was criticised again — this time for setting a poor example to mothers, who ought to take their full maternity leave entitlement. Like many of the gender-charged debates surrounding her leadership, it was one she could never win.

從2012年她擔任雅虎首席執行官的第一天起，性別問題便是顯而易見的。當初，一些人認爲她身懷六甲無法勝任這項工作。當她只請了兩週產假時，她再次遭受批評——這次是因爲她給母親們樹立了一個糟糕的例子，她們應該享受完整的產假福利。和很多圍繞她的領導角色、充斥着濃厚性別色彩的爭論一樣，她永遠贏不了。

Preconceptions made Ms Mayer’s job at Yahoo difficult in more subtle ways, too. During her first few months, with the share price rising because of an increase in the value of the company’s stake in Alibaba, the Chinese ecommerce group, expectations rose so high that it would have been impossible for anyone to meet them.

成見也在一些較微妙的地方令邁耶在雅虎的工作難以開展。在她上任後的數月內，隨着雅虎股價因爲對中國電子商務集團阿里巴巴(Alibaba)的持股增值而上升，人們的期望值高漲，以至於不可能有人能實現這些期望。

Never mind that the company had churned through five chief executives in as many years; that revenues were falling as it lost ad sales, or that private equity types had been sniffing around in search of a bargain for some time. Never mind that Ms Mayer had never before run a company.

不要想這家公司這些年來五次換帥，不用管營收隨着廣告銷售放緩而不斷下滑，也不要考慮一段時間以來私人股本公司頻頻嗅探想要低價收購雅虎，更不用想邁耶之前從未掌管過一家公司。

You could call this the “glass cliff” — when women are brought into leadership roles only when a situation has been deemed impossible by others.

你可以稱之爲“玻璃懸崖”(glass cliff)——這指的是，只有在其他人都認爲局面已不可挽回的情況下，女性纔會被委以領導角色。

Ms Mayer made mistakes. Many of her acquisitions turned out to be duds, for example. This was particularly the case with Tumblr, which has registered writedowns of more than $700m[CHKD]. Her vision for expanding Yahoo by focusing on mobile, social, video and native advertising was neither convincing nor something she was able to put into practice.

邁耶犯過錯誤。例如，在她主導的收購中，許多被證明是不成功的。特別是收購Tumblr，後者資產減記超過7億美元。她設想以手機、社交、視頻和原生廣告爲重心，對雅虎進行擴張，這既無法令人信服，她也無法付諸實踐。

Yet she made brave calls, notably her decision last year to split off Yahoo’s stake in Alibaba. The plan was scuttled because of tax concerns but kicked off the process that led to the sale of Yahoo.

不過，她進行了勇敢的嘗試，尤其是去年她決定拆分雅虎對阿里巴巴持有的股份。由於納稅方面的考慮，該計劃以失敗告終，但是由此開啓了通往出售雅虎的道路。

Ultimately Yahoo’s problems proved so deep that it would have been all but impossible for any chief executive, male or female, to return the company to its former glory. Ms Mayer has gamely made the most of it.

歸根結底，雅虎存在的問題如此嚴峻，任誰來當這個首席執行官——不管是男性還是女性——要帶領這家公司恢復昔日榮光都幾乎是不可能的。邁耶很勇敢，她已經盡力了。