My FT column this week is about Jerry Yang and why founders can make bad CEOs.

Switching jobs from Chief Yahoo to Yahoo Chief does not sound like a stretch. It was for Jerry Yang.

This week, he signalled an end to his short and rocky tenure as chief executive of the company he founded. When a successor is found, he goes back to being its corporate conscience, board director, 4 per cent shareholder and resident nice guy.

Mr Yang wrote to Yahoo employees on Monday that: “All of you know that I have always, and will always bleed purple [Yahoo’s corporate colour]. I will always do what I think is right for this great company”.

That was the problem.

In terms of Yahoo’s share price, Mr Yang’s period at the helm was a failure. It stood at $28 when he took over from Terry Semel in June 2007 and fell to just over $10 on Monday, when the announcement came. Along the way, he spurned a $31-a-share takeover offer from Microsoft.

What he thought was right for Yahoo turned out not to be, and his passion for the enterprise he built, which he thought could flourish independently, was misguided. Sometimes, what a company requires is not a passionate leader but a dispassionate one.

You can read the rest of the column here and comment below.

November 19, 2008 9:34pm in Management, Technology | Comment