Workplace Porn

No, it is not what you think, sorry to disappoint you. This is an interesting article. I have two daughters in Universities and they can go to certain websites and see ratings on professors and assess who they should take or not (when I was going to school, you had to ask around). Well, now there is a new website where employees rate leaders . . . I teach statistics and give speeches so I am use to being rated by the attendees (not always the best thing when you get the feedback but I have found it always helpful). However, there are many leaders out there that are not use to being rated . . . so you might ask yourself, would you operate differently if you knew you were going to be rated by staff . . . I hope not, that should not matter, you should be a good leader (especially if reading this blog, LOL). What will people say about YOU?

Workplace Porn
Quentin Hardy,

Jerry Yang, your stock is in trouble.

This time, it's not (necessarily) the value of Yahoo! (nasdaq: YHOO - news - people ), where Yang is chief executive, that is cause for concern, but the way Yang's staff feels about him, at least according to reports from start-up Glassdoor.com.

The new Web site, based in Sausalito, Calif., aims to uncover salaries, work conditions ­and workplace attitudes of employees at some of America's biggest companies by collecting contributions from current employees. The company officially launched its beta site Tuesday night.

Based on relatively modest-size samples (ranging from 32 to 129 reviews apiece), Glassdoor.com reports that Yang has an overall approval rating of 59%, compared with 69% for Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) chief (and one time Yahoo! suitor) Steve Ballmer and 86% for Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) chief Eric Schmidt.

Among the other tech companies with more than 10 contributions to date, Cisco Systems (nasdaq: CSCO - news - people ) chief John Chambers leads with a 93% approval rating.

For what its worth, Yang beats IBM (nyse: IBM - news - people ) boss Sam Palmisano, who has a 57% approval rating based on 36 reviews.

Overall, company satisfaction is highest at Cisco (with a "very satisfied," or 4.4 out of five points), lowest at Hewlett-Packard (nyse: HPQ - news - people ) (which ranked a "neutral" score of 3.1).

Of course, 36 reviews out of IBM's work force of 380,000 hardly make this a scientific survey. Also, most of those reviews are pretty superficial: "All in all a great place to work for with endless opportunities …" according to an accounting analyst in Somers, N.Y.

But Glassdoor is just testing the waters. So far its site has some 3,300 reviews and salary reports on more than 250 companies in industries as diverse as banking and media. It has focused, at least for now, on reports about Microsoft, Yahoo!, Google and Cisco.

Typically, other sites that offer salary data base their information on survey data. For instance, Salary.com (nasdaq: SLRY - news - people ) works with data sets compiled by other organizations that have collected data reported by employers rather than employees.

Glassdoor was founded by people previously involved in travel site Expedia (nasdaq: EXPE - news - people ) and home-values site Zillow; thus its creators are accustomed to turning to consumers for information. The site goal: to become a gathering place for anyone who wonders if they are underpaid, overworked, unloved or even luckier than the next working stiff.

Glassdoor's founders expect people will use the site when job hunting, negotiating a salary or just benchmarking how their career trajectories compare with others'.

The salary information is examined by editors before posting to avoid average-distorting spoofs. The site is counting on the law of large numbers to make its data valuable: If it can get enough contributions, the distortions will even out. The company hopes to gain revenue from advertising, particularly from job-hunting Web sites like Monster.com.

So far, Glasshouse is reporting some eye-popping salary variations among the companies. Software engineers at Yahoo! make anywhere from $70,000 a year to $150,000. Account managers at Cisco earn anywhere from $65,000 to $220,000. With bonus, the average software engineer's salary at Yahoo! is $118,000, compared with $113,000 at Google and $105,000 at Microsoft.

Employee comments offer pros and cons of working there, as well as advice to management. Even with the relatively small number of submissions, it is possible to get the flavor of a company. Microsoft comes across as a really big bureaucracy with tons of money and geeks. Google is filled with brainy elites who think of themselves that way and is characterized by an uncoordinated management style. Yahoo! seems like a fun place, even if its executives are running scared and consumed with Google envy. Cisco is demanding and technically challenging with too many meetings and a culture of cheapness.