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Google's Idea of Productivity Is a Bad Fit For Many Other Workplaces

Posted by Soulskill on from the do-not-try-this-at-home dept.

New submitter rjupstate writes "Google places a lot of value on the spontaneous creativity that can occur when two employees from completely different parts of the company meet. It's an ideal that Google has perfected over the years, but it's not something that will work for most other organizations. Executives trying to replicate Google's approach could even create major problems among their workforces."

13 of 167 comments (clear)

  1. Google, eh? by serviscope_minor · · Score: 5, Interesting

    While google do this and I'm sure are very good at it, it's not Google's invention and it's certainly not new.

    This is/was one of the major roles that the US National Labs play. Compared to univesities there is a lot more mixing between divisions and as a result a lot of very interesting science gets done because new and unexpected things pop up.

    Of course now that they're run by nice efficient profit making private companies rather than hippie commie inefficient public universities, that's pretty much been killed and all semblance of productivity has gone. But that's a rant for another day.

    If companies think that this kind of innication nd productivity is a bad fit then it's because they're assuming implicitly that they won't be around for more than a year. If they're going to be around you need to develop new products and also develop better ways of creating/designing/building those products. If you're not doing that, then you risk losing out to someone who does.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
    1. Re:Google, eh? by davester666 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You've got to make the numbers some random individuals who call themselves "analysts" each quarter, otherwise you are out.

      This kind of innovation takes more than 90 days to develop, implement, ship and market, therefore, it has no value.

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    2. Re:Google, eh? by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yup, they've made it very clear - as do many other successful tech companies - that they consider the hiring process to be the most important thing they do.

      You hire a certain type of people and it's virtually certain that some innovation will occur under your roof, because that kind of person will be bored senseless if they don't. Combine that with a company mandate to spend 20% of your time doing whatever the hell you want to and that's Google's recipe for success - like good bread - fine ingredients, given space to grow, not forced like the Chorleywood white bread process that most companies want.

      Valve also grok this. Their employee manual basically says "organize yourself into groups and do whatever the hell you want" (yes, really).

      Meyer's problem is she doesn't understand this. Rather than doing what Google do - make the office so damn nice that people WANT to go there - she's just mandating that people HAVE to go there. Whether she argued for the carrot and the board told her that they couldn't afford it, so she had to use the stick, or whether she just thought that Google was too soft while she was there, doesn't make a difference.

      Google understands - creative people dislike being told what to do, but more importantly LOATHE being told how to do it.

    3. Re:Google, eh? by TWiTfan · · Score: 5, Insightful

      While google do this and I'm sure are very good at it, it's not Google's invention and it's certainly not new.

      To me Google sounds like a nightmarish place to work. It's my understanding that most of those perks they provide aren't designed to make you happier, they're designed to keep you at work 24/7. They want to make the campus a "home away from home" precisely so you'll never go home. Combine that with the idea of working out in the open, with no personal space to call your own, and it all sounds very Orwellian to me. I used to work at a place like that. Every morning, everyone had to get together and recite the company's mission statement. Groupthink and the echo chamber reigned supreme, and everyone was expected to be a glassy eyed member of the cult, with no disagreement or debate tolerated. Got out of there as fast as I could (lucky for me, because they folded not long after that). Life in an isolated bubble is no way to live, and no way to develop good product either (since the bubble can become a real reality distortion field too).

      --
      The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
    4. Re:Google, eh? by DuckDodgers · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Google only gets away with operating this way due to their profitability. They can consider the 20% partly as a means to keep employees motivated and happy to stay with the company, and partly as a kind of investment into research and development. If the company's profitability decreases, you can bet there will be shareholders howling for the 20% to be axed - and I see that event, if it occurs, as the beginning of Google's transition into the next Microsoft.

      It's difficult to make a logical argument for the 20% plan for a company that's not currently profitable. How would you present that to executives? "I know we're barely breaking even, but if you give the employees 20% of their time to work on independent projects, I think our long term prospects will improve." I suspect it would work in many cases - you would boost morale, have better employee retention, and some of the employees would use that 20% time to learn skills that make their performance improve in their primary jobs. But it's difficult to quantify, and I think most people would just view it as a 20% loss of productivity with less than equal gain in other areas. That's capitalism... and as much as I hate it, I'm not aware of anything better.

    5. Re:Google, eh? by nblender · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Some of my fondest work-related memories are the times where I flew on-site and worked into the wee hours of the morning with my co-workers (some of whom also flew in)... 2 weeks of intense productivity pulling off herculean tasks while at the same time, all going out for meals/drinks, laughing, joking around...

      I don't think I could do it fulltime but in brief bursts, those are the days I remember having the greatest creativity and productivity...

  2. The secret of Google's success by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When a company is successful - especially a sexy tech company - other companies always seem to try to copy their working practices to try and emulate that success. 20 years ago it was Microsoft. Before that it was IBM. These days it's Google.

    Well, I can reveal the one thing you need to be as successful as Google: Have an effective monopoly on internet searches. Or Operating systems. Or computers.

    The thing is, Google can be as inefficient as it likes. It has a hefty cash cow bringing in the money. Perhaps Google's idea here works, perhaps it doesn't. The fact that Google does it doesn't make it magic. You need a product to make a lot of money.

    1. Re:The secret of Google's success by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This isn't a criticism of Google. Google is at liberty to experiment with management ideas because they've earned that right (or at least the money to do so). It's a criticism of management types who think they can emulate Google's success by doing what Google does.

    2. Re:The secret of Google's success by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Managers and executives are always looking at successful companies (or reading books about them). That's part of their job: to keep up with developments in their professional field. And if something seems to be working well for one company, it makes a lot of sense to try it in another.

      The difference is made by the quality of the manager. Bad ones will blindly copy something they think worked for another firm, then fail to recognise success or understand the reasons behind a failure. Sadly I've seen my share of those, but there are plenty of good managers too, who don't copy blindly. They understand key factors in the success of a particular way of doing things, know if these are also applicable in their own company, know how to implement change and to evaluate its effects. At a distance, it might seem all these managers are doing the same thing and can only hope to achieve success by accident, but that's not always the case.

      The article points out such details: there are good reasons for Google to be doing this, and there may be good reasons why the same approach isn't going to work for someone else.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    3. Re:The secret of Google's success by mysidia · · Score: 5, Insightful

      When a company is successful - especially a sexy tech company - other companies always seem to try to copy their working practices to try and emulate that success.

      Also.... Google's current practices might be what they need to do to stay ahead; Not what you need to do, if you are not at the top and want to get there and win.

      When you're not at the top... you may be better served by concentrating your efforts on a smaller number of products, to become the best; small number of products/innovations, to become the leader in one specific product -- choose a product that can easily be expanded upon (Search can be expanded upon naturally, because you get people visiting your site for search, now you have a chance to start offering them additional things later).
      Because your available cash is very limited, and the risk of not producing is high; even if you were to develop a large number of ideas, it would probably be fiscally irresponsible to attempt to pursue or use all the resources to consider as many product ideas as Google could consider...

      For a non-leader, innovation is important, BUT constraint on innovation is also important. You need a way of deciding upon a few innovations, that can be protected or are not easily replicated, in order to win.

      Then once you are at the top, you have succeeded, after you have committed all the appropriate investments into strategic uses and maintaining leadership and expanding your business... you might want to devote some resources to expanding into other areas mainly as a hedge against risk from competitors, innovating is a lot harder -- and you can afford some extra costs in terms of inneficiency, if it will probably help give you the ideas and ability to execute you need to expand into additional territory, maintain your edge, and avoid being eclipsed by a competitor.

      Since you are already on the top in one area -- what's the worst that could go wrong? You could have a secondary product fail at a small cost, but huge prospects for more profit.

      Maybe loss of worker productivity does not adversly affect the bottom line for an internet business like Google; which have few interactions to manage with customers or users of their products.

      Maybe the way you define productivity (And therefore: what kind of influence Telework would have on it), is inherently connected to the current goals and state of the company.

      What workers are more likely to do who telework or with random encounters, might translate differently dependant on the company's needs

      In other words: someone who accomplishes the exact same amount of work, and comes up with the exact same amount type and nature of ideas and collaborations, has the exact same discussions

      Might be defined to be less productive in one company, and more productive in another company.

      Because different things that they did (such as participation in discussions) might have different value.

      In other words company-relative productivity. In this case, there are no hard and fast rules, about what makes workers more productive, because different companies get different utility, and a single-dimensional numerical access is a misleading way of representing worker utility

  3. Rubbish by evilmidnightbomber77 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I used to find out more interesting stuff in a couple of minutes in the smoking shelter than in any organised meeting. I work in IT infrastructure btw.

  4. Academic research by thegarbz · · Score: 5, Funny

    Well yes of course. If there's one thing I have learned from reading the Harvard Business Review is that to build a successful company your management structure needs to be flexible yet strict, specific and diverse, your company needs to have a flat organisational chart with few managers, it needs many levels of management to keep it under control. You need to keep your employees happy by letting them think for themselves, and you need to control their every movement and thought throughout the day. You need to diversify and yet focus on your core competencies.

    The reality is that the only universally unsuccessful business strategy is thinking that simply copying some successful company will guarantee you success. In any other case I'm sure I can find an example in the Harvard Business Review where {insert management fad of the week} will be the best thing your company can't do without.

  5. 60s era thinking by Goldsmith · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I used to work at General Atomics's original campus in La Jolla, which was created in the 60s.

    The campus was mainly a series of concentric circles. The main circular building had a curvature which was "calculated" to maximize random interactions with scientists and engineers outside your normal working group while also giving an illusion of working in a small group. There were pools, gyms, baseball fields and support buildings around the outside and along the radial lines. The center of the circle was a large cafeteria.

    This was all great as long as nuclear power was going to save the world and money was rolling in. When the company hit hard times the ball fields were turned into office rentals and many non essential services were stopped.

    When the company once again was making money with military hardware, the new buildings were simpler and located in a less expensive area of San Diego.