Ratings15
Average rating4.1
"Jack Welch's Straight from the Gut was once the essential primer for managers, but today's leaders need a new playbook. In HOW GOOGLE WORKS, Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg distill their decades of working in the high-tech industry into a practical and fun-to-read guide for those who want to succeed in an ever-changing business landscape. The book offers how-to advice on strategy, corporate culture, talent, decision-making, innovation, communication and dealing with disruption. The authors explain how the confluence of three seismic changes--the internet, mobile, and cloud computing--has shifted the balance of power between consumer and corporation. The companies that thrive will be the ones that create superior products and attract a new breed of multi-faceted employees whom the authors dub "smart creatives." The management maxims are illustrated with previously unreported anecdotes from Google's corporate history. "Back in 2010, Eric and I created an internal class for Google managers focusing on the lessons the management team learned the hard way," says Rosenberg. "The class slides all said 'Google confidential' until an employee suggested we uphold the spirit of openness and share them with the world. This book codifies the recipe for our secret sauce: how Google innovates and how Google empowers employees to succeed.""--
Reviews with the most likes.
I'm pretty sure my workplace practices some form of at least 90% of the ideas and advice in this book, so this is a bit hard to review given that I didn't really learn much from it, but it has a clear influence on my daily life.
It was still an easy listen and hearing it straight from the horses mouth with some clear examples from Google was interesting.
A worthwhile book - both entertaining and insightful. If it's an area in which you have interest (business with or management of “smart creatives”) the. I would recommend it. Also, if you're just curious about Google (as the title might reflect), the content will likely be interesting.
It was a good and amusing read with some geeky humor interspersed along with raw wisdom.
But like many other books (mostly motivational and self help ones) reader should beware of the survivorship bias! This is how Google works, described as clearly and directly as possible, but this is not necessarily how Google turned into a billion(?) dollar company. Many other dead companies have had few or most of such traits but didn't succeed!
So, my advise: apply with care! :)