Carslbad (CA) - Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sure knows how to motivate his older employees.  Speaking at the D: All Things Digital Conference in Carlsbad California, Ballmer said that his company is much more agile than it was in the old days. He told the audience that Microsoft had a lot of dead weight in the early years.  He also talked about Microsoft’s constant catch up game with Google in the search engine market.

In historical terms Microsoft hasn’t been around for a long time.  Founded a little more than 30 years ago, the company now has around 78,000 employees.  Despite having so many workers, Ballmer firmly believes that Microsoft can innovate from the bottom up and pointed to the Silverlight cross-platform multimedia player.

But while Ballmer praised Microsoft’s current batch of workers, he took a swing at older and former employees.  “People we had then weren’t as good (as Bill Gates and Paul Allen) and they are gone,” said Ballmer.

Ballmer acknowledged Google’s dominance in the search market, but couldn’t convince himself to say “Google” and saying instead “the market leader”.  He said that Google had momentum, but says that Microsoft could catch up in improving the user experience and interface of search engines.

The D conference is hosted by the Wall Street Journal and Walt Mossberg.  The conference is often compared to the DEMO show held in the fall where companies pay to present new products.  In contrast, high tech executives are invited to D to show off their latest wares for free – as long as they submit to the grilling of Mr. Mossberg.

Quit workin on other junk

May 30, 2007 17:03     

and fix Vista
Sasparilla Mayonase report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Biting the hand that fed him

May 30, 2007 17:24     

That's nice. Criticize the people that made Microsoft one of the largest software houses in the world. Also, Ballmer's referring to Google only as the market leader makes it sound like he's in denial.
Dave report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

funny guy...

May 30, 2007 19:09     

Nothing wrong with wishful thinking. Perhaps that was mean. Microsoft so far has a very proven trackrecord of remarkable success in whatever market is has entered: word processing, excell, OS, and recently with game consoles. XBox 360 may not be a clear winner yet but it is definitely a big step up from the XBox days. The next game console is always around the corner. Zune may be a failure right now but who knows where Zune 2 may go. I reserve the right to have skepticism about MSFT's ability to claim the throne to the online advertising market. But with a company that is sitting on that much cash, there is always hope. You never know what genius it may be able to bring in or acquire one year.

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Typical issue for big companies

May 30, 2007 22:07     

A small software company hires programmers, when it needs managers it promotes programmers. Programmers make lousy managers. Most companies go through a stage where they have to get rid of people that were poorly promoted in the early days.
Bob report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Look who's talkin'

May 30, 2007 23:27     

Funny thing -- *Ballmer* fits in the category of "People we had then weren't as good". Unfortunately he's still there, which explains why the current crop of products aren't that good (and their stock sucks compared to peers too).
sarcast1c report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

How stupid can one company be?

May 31, 2007 01:51     

Quick someone replace Ballmer before it's too late!! He spends 6 billion on an advertising company, tells he few remain technical gurus to go shove it he's found cheap off shore labor, and then tells everyone that Vista sales are bad because of pirating??? Ha ha ha ha ha -- Ballmer has lost it, his daily fortune teller is Rasputin. Steve how about you produce some GOOD software that isn't full of DRM and advertisments?? Oh well, I guess he's just leaving the door open for Apple to take over. What A TOOL!

V8VENOM report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Good comment Bob....

May 31, 2007 02:26     

That's exactly what it is. I've been in 2 revs of growth companies and every time the same error; promote "engineers" to management, suffer from their poor people skills and eventually get rid of 'em once out of the "growth mode"...
Alex Gauthier report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Bob missing the boat on Programmers

May 31, 2007 06:49     

Bob, While it may be true some Programmers are promoted to management, doesn't mean ALL are bad. I know a lot of companies that promote programmers to management because they can't program, and instead of firing them, they promote them to get in a new programmer who can hopefully manage. So now you have an incompetent who can't program in charge of programmers. Any wonder why there is so much vaporware today??? I know a lot of good programmers who refuse management positions, but I also know a lot of programmers who made outstanding managers! To claim one group of workers would never make good managers shows how little you truly know of that group. Most of the Dot net boom came from programmers who STARTED companies and are living large today.

Chris report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Ballmer lives in a fantasy. Microsoft's upper ma...

May 31, 2007 07:40     

Ballmer lives in a fantasy. Microsoft's upper management is so concerned with circling the wagons and defending their current position that it clearly has problems with in house development
mike potter report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Older Does Not Mean Dumber

May 31, 2007 08:53     

Just because a person is older does not mean they are dummber or become less intelegent as they get older (unless one is talking about Balmer. :) ).
BigWarpGuy report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Have you seen my boat. It must be missing.

Jun 01, 2007 03:53     

And it was full of programmers. Programmers can make good managers, but it is the exception rather than the rule. Nothing against programmers, but they are very different skills. It happens in many areas, and is referred to as "Promoting someone to the level of their incompetence." When people do well they get promoted until they reach the position they are not able to handle and stay there. This is a lousy place to test one another's knowledge of startups, but have you noticed that businesses are typically started by different people than the ones who continue to run them? It relies on completely different skills. God gives everyone different abilities. A manager is not really superior to a programmer, they just have different tasks.

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