[kornish]

Well, for one, being an executive at a multi-billion dollar giant which was growing or doing well.

edit: by "executive", I was including the whole C-suite – should have clarified.

[jacquesm]

But which multi-billion dollar giant would go for an in-experienced CEO?

Running a department of a large company is not the same as being CEO of even a much smaller one.

I figure the only reason she was given a shot was that the Yahoo! board hoped the Google magic had somehow rubbed off on Mayer and that that alone would make the difference. Other than that I don't see what would have gotten her a CEO spot, especially not in a growing company at the multi-billion $ level.

Yahoo! did not have that much to lose at that point in time.

[wwalser]

The person above you didn't say CEO. They said exec.

If she had stayed at Google and had some equity comp she would have netted more money. Absolutely.

[pmlnr]

But those tend to hire/promote CEOs who can actually push things forward.

[kornish]

Not all executives are chief executives. Meyer surely could have gotten another VP or SVP job at a non-Google company with momentum. To require compensation for risk/opportunity cost in foregoing those opportunities seems very reasonable.

[oh_sigh]

What company fitting that description could Mayer have gone to?