Marissa Mayer facts for kids
Marissa Ann Mayer (born May 30, 1975) is an American business leader and investor. She was the president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Yahoo! from 2012 to 2017. Before that, she was an important executive and leader at Google, where she was employee number 20. Later, Mayer helped start a technology company called Sunshine. In 2017, she left Yahoo! after the company's main business was sold to Verizon Communications. She is known for her work in technology and her leadership roles.
Quick facts for kids
Marissa Mayer
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Mayer in 2013
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| Born |
Marissa Ann Mayer
May 30, 1975 Wausau, Wisconsin, U.S.
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| Education | Stanford University (BS, MS) |
| Occupation | Co-founder, Sunshine Contacts |
| Board member of |
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| Spouse(s) |
Zachary Bogue
(m. 2009) |
| Children | 3 |
Contents
Early Life and Interests
Marissa Mayer was born in Wausau, Wisconsin. Her mother was an art teacher, and her father was an environmental engineer. She has a younger brother. As a child, she described herself as "painfully shy." However, she was always busy with many after-school activities. She took part in ballet, ice-skating, piano, swimming, debate, and was a Girl Scout Brownie. Ballet taught her important lessons like discipline and confidence. From a young age, she was very interested in math and science.
Education and Learning
High School Years
While attending Wausau West High School, Marissa Mayer was active in many clubs and sports. She was on the curling team and the precision dance team. She was excellent in science subjects like chemistry, calculus, biology, and physics. She was also president of the Spanish club, treasurer of the Key Club, and captain of both the debate team and the pom-pom squad. Her debate team won the state championship, and her pom-pom squad was the state runner-up. After graduating in 1993, she was chosen as one of Wisconsin's delegates to attend the National Youth Science Camp.
University Studies at Stanford
Marissa Mayer first planned to become a brain surgeon for children when she went to Stanford University. She took pre-med classes. However, she later changed her main subject to "symbolic systems." This special field combines philosophy, how the mind works (cognitive psychology), language studies (linguistics), and computer science. At Stanford, she continued to dance in the university ballet's Nutcracker. She also volunteered at children's hospitals and helped bring computer science education to schools in Bermuda.
During her third year, she taught a class about symbolic systems. The students liked her class so much that her supervisor asked her to teach another class during the summer. Marissa graduated with honors from Stanford. She earned a Bachelor of Science (BS) degree in symbolic systems in 1997 and a Master of Science (MS) degree in computer science in 1999. For both degrees, she focused on artificial intelligence. For her final project in college, she created software that could recommend travel plans to users using natural, human-like language.
Honorary Degree
In 2009, the Illinois Institute of Technology gave Mayer an honorary doctorate degree. This was to recognize her important work in the field of search technology. Before her career, she also worked as an intern at research labs like SRI International and Ubilab. She holds several patents, which are special rights for inventions, in artificial intelligence and how computer programs are designed for users.
Career Journey
Working at Google (1999–2012)
After finishing her studies at Stanford, Marissa Mayer received many job offers. In 1999, she joined Google as employee number 20. She started by writing computer code and leading small teams of engineers. She helped develop and design Google's search products. She became known for paying close attention to details. This helped her get promoted to product manager and later to director of consumer web products. She was in charge of the simple and well-known design of Google's homepage. She was also part of the small team that created AdWords. This is an advertising platform that helps businesses show their products to people who are searching for related things online. AdWords brought in a lot of money for Google.
In 2002, Mayer started a special program at Google called the Associate Product Manager (APM) program. This program helped Google find new talented people and train them for leadership roles. Each year, Mayer chose young employees for this two-year program, where they took extra assignments and classes. Many successful people came from this program. In 2005, Mayer became Vice President of Search Products and User Experience. She played important roles in developing many Google products, including Google Search, Google Images, Google News, Google Maps, Google Books, and Gmail.
Mayer was the vice president of Google Search Products and User Experience until 2010. Then, the CEO of Google asked her to lead the Local, Maps, and Location Services teams. In 2011, she helped Google buy the survey website Zagat. While working at Google, she also taught computer programming at Stanford and helped students at a local charter school. She received awards for her teaching from Stanford.
Leading Yahoo! (2012–2017)
On July 16, 2012, Marissa Mayer was chosen to be the president and CEO of Yahoo!. She also joined the company's board of directors. At that time, Yahoo!'s performance was not as strong as Google's, and the company had changed leaders several times. To make things simpler and improve the company's culture, Mayer started an online program called PB&J. This program allowed employees to share their complaints and vote on problems in the office. If a problem received enough votes, management would automatically look into it.
In 2013, Mayer made a big change at Yahoo! that required employees who worked from home to start working in the office. She also changed Yahoo!'s maternity leave policy, giving parents more time off and a cash bonus. This was similar to policies at other big technology companies.
In May 2013, Mayer led Yahoo! to buy Tumblr for $1.1 billion. In July 2013, Yahoo! reported that its profits had increased, even though its revenues had fallen slightly. By September 2013, Yahoo!'s stock price had doubled since Mayer became CEO. However, much of this growth was also due to Yahoo!'s ownership in a Chinese e-commerce company called Alibaba Group, which happened before Mayer joined.
In 2014, Fortune magazine listed Mayer as one of the top 40 business leaders under 40 years old. She was also named the 16th most powerful businesswoman in the world by the same magazine. However, in 2015, Yahoo!'s stock continued to fall, and many important executives left the company. In March 2016, Fortune named Mayer as one of the world's most disappointing leaders.
In February 2016, Mayer confirmed that Yahoo! was thinking about selling its main business. In March 2017, it was reported that Mayer might receive a large payment when Yahoo! was sold to Verizon. Mayer announced her resignation on June 13, 2017. During her time as CEO, Yahoo! saw big drops in advertising money and a large reduction in staff. However, Mayer highlighted that the company had achieved many things under her leadership, such as increasing its market value and growing its mobile users.
In November 2017, Mayer spoke before the United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. She discussed major security problems that happened at Yahoo! in 2013 and 2014.
Workplace Fairness
A former Yahoo! employee filed a lawsuit in 2015, saying that Marissa Mayer encouraged a system for reviewing employee performance that might have been unfair to male employees. He claimed that his good performance reviews changed before he was let go, and his role was given to a woman who had just been hired. This case was later dismissed. Another lawsuit was filed earlier in 2014, claiming that the company's performance system was unfair and used to hide layoffs.
Starting Sunshine (2018–present)
After leaving Yahoo! in 2017, Mayer started a new company called Lumi Labs with a former colleague. The company is based in Palo Alto, California, and focuses on artificial intelligence and consumer media. In November 2020, Mayer announced that Lumi Labs would be renamed Sunshine. At the same time, she launched its first product, Sunshine Contacts. This product aims to improve users' phone contacts using smart computer programs and public information. In November 2024, Sunshine launched the Shine app, which is an artificial intelligence platform for sharing photos.
Board Memberships
Marissa Mayer serves on the boards of directors for several companies and non-profit organizations. These include Walmart, Maisonette, and Jawbone. She has also served on the boards of the Cooper–Hewitt, National Design Museum, New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Business Investments
Mayer actively invests her money in technology companies. Some of her investments include:
- Minted: A company that sells designs created by many people.
- Airtime.com: A platform for live video.
- uBeam: A startup that works on wireless power.
- Brit + Co.: An online community and store for do-it-yourself (DIY) projects.
- Square: A company that processes mobile payments.
- One Kings Lane: A website for home decor.
- Natera: A company that does genetic testing.
- Nootrobox: A company focused on products to improve brain function.
Awards and Recognition
Marissa Mayer has received many awards and recognitions throughout her career:
- She was named to Fortune magazine's list of America's 50 Most Powerful Women in Business several times from 2008 to 2014. In 2008, at age 33, she was the youngest woman ever on this list.
- In 2009, Glamour Magazine named her one of their Women of the Year.
- She was on Forbes Magazine's List of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2012, 2013, and 2014.
- In September 2013, Mayer became the first CEO of a Fortune 500 company to be featured in Vogue magazine.
- In 2013, she was also included in the Time 100 list of the most influential people. She was the first woman to be ranked number one on Fortune magazine's annual list of the top 40 business stars under 40 years old.
- In 2013, Mayer made Fortune magazine history by appearing on all three of its annual lists in the same year: Businessperson of the Year, Most Powerful Women, and 40 Under 40. However, in March 2016, Fortune later named Mayer as one of the world's most disappointing leaders.
- In December 2015, she was listed by Richtopia as number 14 in the list of 500 Most Influential CEOs.
- In 2017, Mayer appeared on the list of women CEOs of Fortune 500 companies.
Personal Life
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Marissa Mayer married lawyer and investor Zachary Bogue on December 12, 2009.
On the same day Yahoo! announced her hiring in July 2012, Mayer shared that she was pregnant. She gave birth to a boy named Macallister on September 30, 2012. On December 10, 2015, Mayer announced that she had given birth to identical twin girls, Marielle and Sylvana.
Mayer is a member of the Lutheran church. She has said that her priorities are "God, family and Yahoo!, except I'm not that religious, so it's really family and Yahoo!." As of May 2024, Mayer's estimated wealth was about $970 million.
Marissa Mayer Quotes
- "I always did something I was a little not ready to do. I think that's how you grow. When there's that moment of 'Wow, I'm not really sure I can do this,' and you push through those moments, that's when you have a breakthrough."
- "If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room."
- "Do something you're not ready to do. In the worst case, you'll learn your limitations."
- "People are more productive when they're alone, but they're more collaborative and innovative when they're together."
- "If you push through that feeling of being scared, that feeling of taking risk, really amazing things can happen."
- "Success is never getting to the bottom of your to-do list."
- "You can't have everything you want, but you can have the things that really matter to you."
- "I love technology, and I don't think it's something that should divide along gender lines."
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See also
In Spanish: Marissa Mayer para niños
