Laszlo joined Google in 2006, when Google was a 6000 employee company. It's now grown to 60,000, with 70 offices, spread across 40 countries. Fortune named Google the 'best company to work for' an unprecedented five times. This also in numerous other countries, as diverse as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Ireland and yes, In India too.
Google is the most sought after place to work on the planet, according to Linkedin, and receives more than 2 million applications every year. And hiring is a few thousand, making Google twenty five times more selective than Harvard, Yale or Princeton.
They (Laszlo) must be doing something darn right.
They (Laszlo) must be doing something darn right.
Laszlo says: "Leaders always speak of putting people first, and then treated them like replaceable gears. I have worked in an environment where our sole purpose was to change the world, and another where it was all about profits, and it just didn't make sense to me, no matter where I turned, people weren't treated better in their jobs. You spend more time working than doing anything else in life. It's not right that the experience at work, even at some of the best employers, should be so demotivating and dehumanizing.
This book is about this journey, sometimes exhausting, sometimes frustrating, but always surging forward to create an environment of purpose, freedom and creativity, and what can be done to put people first and transform how you live and lead."
The reason I picked up this book is to help a friend create an HR framework for his company, and I started by picking out specific chapters. But as I read, I found myself reading it like a novel, like whole........it's deeply insightful, and can be used, if not in whole, definitely in parts to impact cultures of companies, of whatever size.
A couple of quotes from the book which seemed like inspiration to Laszlo and which kind of set context:Laszlo Bock has done far more than codify Google's recipe for its high-freedom, high-performance workplace, he has created the essential guide for unleashing talent in the digital age. Intelligent, playful, and practical, WORK RULES! is for all leaders who want to inspire brilliance and bring out the best of humanity in their workforce. LIZ WISEMAN author of Multipliers and Rookie Smarts
CEO of Wegman, Danny Wegman "leading with your heart can make a successful business.Our employees are empowered around this vision to give their best and let no customer leave unhappy"
Chief People Officer Ishan Dantanarayana, of Brandix, a cloth manufacturing company in Srilanka "our goal is inspiring a large female workforce by telling them... come as you are and harness your full potential'" and these efforts have made it the second largest exporter in the country, and recipient of several awards.
High Freedom approach is the future. Command oriented, low freedom management is common because its profitable; it requires less effort and most managers are terrified of the alternative.
Talent will flow to high freedom companies.
Here are the Work Rules in bullets: ( each is a chapter in the book)
- For becoming a founder
- Choose to think of yourself as a founder
- Now act like one
- For Building a Great Culture
- Think of your work as a calling, with a mission that matters
- Give people slightly more trust, freedom, and authority than you are comfortable giving them. If you're not nervous, you haven't given them enough
- For Hiring
- Given limited resources, invest your HR money first in recruiting
- Hire only the best by taking your time, hiring only people who are better than you in some meaningful way, and not letting managers make hiring decisions for their own teams
- For Selecting New Employees
- Set a high bar for quality
- Assess candidates objectively
- Give candidates a reason to join
- For Mass Empowerment
- Eliminate status symbols
- Make decisions based on data, not based on managers opinion
- Find ways for people to shape their work and the company
- For Performance Management
- Set Goals correctly
- Gather peer feedback
- Split rewards conversations from development conversations
- For Managing your two tails
- Help those in need
- Put your best people under a microscope
- Use surveys and checklists to find the truth and nudge people to improve
- Set a personal example by sharing and acting on your own feedback
- For Building a Learning Institution
- Engage in deliberate practice: Break lessons down into small, digestible pieces with clear feedback and do them again and again
- Have your best people teach
- Invest only in courses that you can prove change people's behavior
- For Paying Unfairly
- Swallow hard and pay unfairly. Have wide variations in pay that reflect the power law distribution of performance
- Celebrate accomplishment, not compensation
- Make it easy to spread the love
- Reward thoughtful failure
- For Efficiency, Community, and Innovation
- Make life easier for employees
- Find ways to say Yes
- The bad stuff in life happens rarely....be there for your people when it does
- For nudging towards Health, Wealth and Happiness
- Recognize the difference between what is and what ought to be
- Run lots of small experiments
- Nudge, don't shove
- For Screwing Up
- Admit your mistake. Be transparent about it
- Take counsel from all directions
- Fix whatever broke
- Find the moral in the mistake, and teach it
It's a long list, and I guess we each will take what we can, but listen deeper and you'll truly find the manage with your heart ringing true all through...in alignment for the individual and the company.
As the tag line reads, It's 'Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead'
As the tag line reads, It's 'Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead'
Nice...
ReplyDelete