A day at Googleplex
THE GOOGLEPLEX
Last Friday, I had the great pleasure of spending the day at the Googleplex (Google HQ in Mountain View, CA) learning how The Google builds and maintains high performing teams.
The day was jam-packed with insightful takeaways and valuable lessons from incredible leaders like Harlan Findley, the Director of Strategy, Planning and Analysis for Google's People Operations, Jim Marocco, the former Vice President of Finance for Alphabet/Google, and Briana Kearns, Staffing and Operations Analyst.
In addition to learning from these great leaders, I enjoyed the opportunity to tour the Google campus and got to fulfill my personal dream of jumping into a ball pit, sinking a hole in one (putt-putt), riding bikes, cracking a beer, and seeing a legit Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton (named Stan) all in the same afternoon.
During the day, I took a heap of notes and here are a few that jumped off the page, in no particular order.
+ (Like a lot of the service-based businesses I work with) Google's number #1 challenge is attracting talent.
+ The top personal trait the G-Team looks for when selecting talent is the desire to learn, followed closely by self-awareness, and a sense of humility.
+ Culture starts at the top.
+ No matter what, people need to be recognized and appreciated.
+ Machine learning will fundamentally change and/or directly impact, how work is done by approximately 10% - 30% of the GLOBAL workforce.
+ We're less than five years away from the production of fully autonomous vehicles.
+ People and data are the new competitive advantage for businesses in the 21st century, replacing oil and real estate.
+ Google employees are no more than 120 feet away from food at any given time, while on campus.
+ Being an a**hole doesn't scale.
+ Google has an annual "bring your parents to work" day.
+ Google is pet-friendly but does not allow cats. Their reasoning? "We're a dog company."
+ It is ABSOLUTELY critical to foster an intentional culture and hire for culture fit.
+ People need to feel safe to take risks while at work.
QUESTION AND ANSWER
In addition to having fun and learning lots, I had the opportunity to ask Jim a question during his presentation about building a high-performing team, where he emphasized the need to regularly recognize your team members.
During the Q&A round, I asked him, "What was the most meaningful form of recognition you ever received at Google?"
I was thrilled by his answer.
It wasn't the special red envelope with ten, crisp $100 dollar bills that he would receive at Christmas time or the extravagant parties the company would host to celebrate specific milestones (those were all wonderful), but the most meaningful form of recognition he EVER received during his 13+ year career was a bottle of wine and a handwritten thank you note from his boss expressing gratitude for the long hours and energy he put towards seeing an important project through.
WOW! Let that sink in for a moment.
Even though Google has billions of dollars in their bank account, the most meaningful form of recognition their VP of Finance EVER received was a handwritten thank you card. Jim did mention that it was indeed a pricey bottle of wine, but it was the thank you card that meant more to him than anything else.
If you haven't yet taken the 3 minutes to write a handwritten thank you for one of your treasured team members, do it now.
This small act of recognition may very well create a positive ripple effect that may be hard to comprehend.
