“Shifting toward management meant greater responsibility and influence, but it also meant giving up programming day-to-day in my role, which was hard because it took me out of my comfort zone.”

American business executive, software engineer, and investor

Marissa Mayer is an American business executive, software engineer, and investor. Born in 1975, she is known for her leadership roles at Google and later as president and chief executive officer of Yahoo! from 2012 to 2017, when the company was sold to Verizon. At Google, Mayer was a long-time executive, a usability leader, and a prominent spokesperson, and she was the company’s first woman software engineer. She later co-founded Sunshine, and after its assets were acquired in 2025, she founded the artificial intelligence company Dazzle AI.