Fat Agnus

Have you sat though a meeting with a client where you are trying to figure out the requirements for a project and experienced the following situation, where they want all the bells and whistles but don’t really want to pay for it ?

This is something I have heard a lot in some form of variation. For some reason, it doesn’t seem to happen any other place. Why is that?

But what if it did.

• Innovation, not instant perfection
  Start rough, learn and iterate.
• Ideas come from everywhere
  Ideas can come from the engineers, managers, users even the financial team.
• Share everything you can
  Everything is put on the intranet, so employees know what is happening.
• You’re brilliant, we’re hiring
  Founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin approve hires. They favor intelligence over experience.
• A license to pursue dreams
  Letting employees use 20% of their time on what ever they want.
• Data is apolitical
  There is no “I like”, it is all about the basing decisions on data.
• Creativity loves constraints
  Engineers thrive on constraints.
• It’s users, not money
  If you can successfully engage users, you can monetize them
• Don’t kill projects, morph them
  Products that doesn’t seem to respond well in the market should be morphed into something the market needs, not cancelled

I can relate to these principals, some more then others. There are especially two I find quite intriguing, “A license to pursue dreams” and “Data is apolitical”.

A lot of companies would probably be scared to let their employees spend 20% of their time on anything they want, because they would fear that they might slack of and not produce anything of value to the company. The interesting thing is, that 50% of all released products from Google come from the 20% that employees spend on there own. In a world where the costs of producing something is cheaper in places like Asia, we in the western world have to differentiate our self by being more innovative. So it might be a good idea to consider if one could (should) apply the Google model or something similar.

I have had the pleasure of sitting through various meetings (usually it’s about design decisions), some good and some less productive once. One thing they have in common is that, at some point, someone will state an argument that begins with “I like..” and then you know things starts to get bad. Arguments based on personal preferences and not data is bound to heat up any discussion.

“Besides wasting time, these arguments create tension and erode respect among team members, and can often prevent the team from making critical decisions.”
Steve Krug, Don’t make me think

Even though this seems obvious to anyone, it stills occur too often, so it is nice to see that Google has build a culture that acknowledge the importance of data.

Marissa Mayer talks about the 9 principles at Stanford University

An interview with Marissa Mayer and the 9 principles

You can`t turn on the news without hearing about people getting fired and nobody really knows when this crisis will be over. I understand that the companies might have to lower their budgets and cut down there expenses so they can survive, but I also get the feeling that somewhere along the line, someone are forgetting that people are the most important asset.

So consider this.

If you let us keep our money, our buildings, and our products, but take our personnel, we’ll go under. But if you take our money, our buildings, and our products, and let us keep the people, we can build it all up again in 10 years.
- Richard R. Dupree of Proctor & Gamble

Now, some companies might say that they know this and that it is a part of the core values that defines the company, but have you asked the employees?

It is more important than ever to make sure that the employees thrive at work, that they feel secure so they can be effective and perform well. Failing to do so will without a doubt bring the company down.