When Sartain signed on with Southwest in 1988, the airline had been struggling to take off for 18 long years. Back then, Southwest counted 5,000 employees and a fleet of about 75 planes; revenue was less than $1 billion a year. By 2000, Southwest had innovated its way to becoming the world's most profitable airline. At a time when most companies were up against labor shortages and were fighting the talent war, Southwest was being flooded with 10,000 ré sumé s a month. The once-tiny airline was widely recognized as one of the country's best places to work. "It was a great time to be at Southwest," Sartain recalls in her new book, HR From the Heart (Amacom, 2003). "But it was also a great time to go."
Sartain always believed that the currency of her success had little to do with past accomplishments -- and everything to do with her ability to make an impact on the airline's immediate future. By the spring of 2001, she knew that her personal ROI at Southwest was in decline. She believed the company's rush to innovate had slowed. In her view, the airline's leadership team was insular; it needed fresh thinking and new ideas. "My husband said that I had outgrown Southwest, but that sounds so arrogant," she says. "I had outgrown my usefulness to Southwest. I think I had become an irritant to them."
Sartain had formed hundreds of friendships during her 13 years at Southwest, and her identification with the company ran deep -- almost to the point where she couldn't imagine herself thriving anywhere else. Leaving the airline was "like getting a divorce -- horribly wrenching." She figured she would take the summer off to regroup. But then she heard that Yahoo was hunting for a new head of HR, and in early July, she began interviewing for the position at Yahoo's Sunnyvale, California campus. Her friends thought that she had lost it. Southwest's balance sheet and margins were tops in the business. Just when the rest of the aviation industry was in a tailspin, she was giving up a first-class seat on the best-run airline in the country.
But after a day of meeting with the executive team at Yahoo's sleek glass-and-steel headquarters, Sartain was convinced that the company's troubles were really opportunities to make an impact at a big-brand Internet company. "I spoke first with Jerry Yang, and he was so focused on culture -- whether he knew it or not," she recalls. "Then I met with [CFO] Sue Decker, and she talked about how people's stock options were under water and how we would have to reinvent rewards to keep people motivated. To have the person holding the purse strings put such a high priority on investing in people -- that was important.
"The icing on the cake was when I met Terry Semel," she continues. "Terry was so focused on building bench strength. He said, 'We're looking at businesses to buy, and we might not have anyone to run them. I need someone to come in here and help me find great leaders who can make money.' I thought, 'This is the most fantastic opportunity in the world.' "
On the day that Decker called to make an offer, Sartain fielded a competing offer from American Airlines. Joining American would have been the safe thing to do. She could have stayed in Dallas; moving to another major airline would have made for a natural transition. Jumping to Yahoo would be a gamble. Semel's turnaround could easily fail. Still, she and her husband left Dallas and set off for Silicon Valley. Libby Sartain was now a Yahoo -- in every sense of the word.
One afternoon during Sartain's first week at her new job, Yahoo held a reception for her. There was a band, wine, and beer -- and no small talk. "I'd ask people, 'What's the first thing I should work on?' " she recalls. "And nearly everyone had the same answer: 'We need to know what Terry is thinking. He needs to announce his plan and tell us what to do.' "
After arriving at Yahoo in May, Semel spent months huddling with the heads of Yahoo's 44 business units. The meetings were casting calls in disguise, a chance for the new CEO to get a read on his leadership team and spotlight businesses that could make the cut and those that had to go. But as Semel listened and took his own counsel, the rest of the company continued to work at its customary feverish pace. For people who live by a fast clock, Semel's three months of study felt like forever.
Sartain didn't hold back. In one of her first meetings with Semel, she told him what was on people's minds. "Everyone was waiting for him to make a big announcement," she says. "They didn't think he was moving fast enough." Semel replied that he didn't care what people were saying. He wouldn't make any announcements until he and his team had formulated a plan. Yahoo was growing up. The days of getting everyone into a room and sharing strategy secrets were gone. People would just have to learn to live with uncertainty. "Not knowing where we were going was tough, but at least for a few months, that was the truth of the matter," concludes Sartain. "We didn't know, and we said so. It was the only way to build trust."
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