Peanut Butter Manifesto

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The "Peanut Butter Manifesto" is a memo purportedly written by Brad Garlinghouse, a senior vice president for Yahoo!. The memo first reached public attention on November 18, 2006. In the memo, Garlinghouse calls for radical change in Yahoo's corporate focus:

"I've heard our strategy described as spreading peanut butter across the myriad opportunities that continue to evolve in the online world. The result: a thin layer of investment spread across everything we do and thus we focus on nothing in particular. I hate peanut butter. We all should."<ref>The 'Peanut Butter Manifesto',' Wall Street Journal Online, November 18, 2006.</ref>

A MarketWatch article noted that a Yahoo representative

"...would not reveal the memo's exact contents. He also would not confirm the authenticity of a version of the purported document published on The Wall Street Journal's Web site."<ref>Charney, Ben. Yahoo exec hits sticky problems in 'Peanut Butter Manifesto', MarketWatch, November 18, 2006.</ref>

The memo appeared on Slashdot later that evening.<ref>Yahoo! VP Calls For a Shakeup, Slashdot, November 18, 2006.</ref>

Garlinghouse's insistence on a tightly focused corporate strategy is reminiscent of the Hedgehog Concept, presented in Good to Great by Jim Collins.