Want to be successful like Google?

The title may sound like spam email, but by any analysis Google is a company that is doing phenomenally well. We can't all be the Goliath that is Google, but we can all learn something from how they recruit, manage, motivate, measure and reward their employees. Want to know what Google knows — here it is from the April edition of the Harvard Business Review [1].
1. Strategic patience — HBR calls it strategic patience, we might call it, taking a long term view. When was the last time you looked up from the bars of your weekly, monthly or quarterly cell of deliverables to gaze at the vista of what you are aiming to achieve in the long term? Why are you letting monthly finance reporting get in your way of doing great work?
2. Test your ideas, market your ideas — using data. It’s easy(ish) to come up with good (sometimes great) ideas but how can you prove it, and make sure people know about it. Google develops hundreds of products and “simultaneously tests and markets them to the user community. In fact testing and marketing are virtually indistinguishable."[2] Not only does this give data showing which products are most likely to succeed, but it creates a special relationship with consumers: it partly developed by them. How is that for involvement?
3. Reward creativity, relax into (some) failure. If you want a highly creative workforce, some creativity will result in failed projects. As one Googler put it “Please fail very quickly — so you can try again.” For creative organisations the speed at new projects are developed means that a failed project is a step closer to the next successful one. A long, carefully planned, measured programme of development could spend 3 years working up to failure, a more agile organisation could have had 30 failures and 3 world-changing ideas in the same time.
4. Use data — Page and Brin (Google’s founders) are tech guys themselves so you would expect them to use analytical and data approaches to deciding which ideas go forward, but there is no reason why even the mathematically challenged can not run surveys, poll existing or potential clients, and test and hone different options. Instead of making your decisions on gut feel, how about finding your own data, or getting help in developing some data driven approaches.
5. Suggestions schemes — would you believe it, some of Google’s success is based on the humble suggestion scheme (does your organisation have one, if not why aren’t you starting one?) But unlike many passive suggestion schemes, Google uses an online discussion forum where staff rate ideas, and these evaluations are used as part of the data gathering process for creating new products.
6. Give them what matters — we know your staff are your most important asset, so why aren’t you giving them a little of what matters most to them. They may not need higher salaries, but might be happy with regular skills updating, or a more relaxed team meeting. Why not use some data gathering skills you are now so keen to implement and survey your staff on what they would like in return for higher levels of creativity.
[1] Iyer, B. and Davenport T., Reverse Engineering Google’s Innovation Machine, HBR April 2008 p 59 — 68
[2] ibid