Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast - Management Assignment Help

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"Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast" If you give people freedom, they will amaze you 
Ireceive a lot of oddball mail at work, usually from people who want to work at Google. I've received T-shirts with resumes silk-screened on them, puzzles, and even sneakers (from some-one wanting to "get their foot in the door"... get it?). I post the more colorful ones on my wall, including one letter that included the phrase "culture eats strategy for breakfast." I'd never heard the phrase but thought it silly enough to keep as an example of manage-ment gibberish. If you do a Google image search for "Google culture" you'll get something like the screenshot on the next page. These pictures encapsulate how first-time visitors perceive Google's culture. The colorful slides and beanbags, the free gour-met food, the crazy offices (yes, that's someone riding a bike through the office), and happy people working together and having a great time all suggest that this place is about work-as-play. There's [ an element of truth to that, but Google's culture has much deeper ' roots. Ed Schein, now retired from the MIT School of Manage-, ment, taught that a group's culture can be studied in three ways: by , kicking at its" artifiters," such as physical space and behaviors; by ?) surveying the beliefs and values espoused by group members; or 
A mission that matters

Google's mission is the first cornerstone of our culture. Our mis-sion is "to organize the world's information and make k universally accessibleand useful."4" How does our mission compare to those of  other companies? Here are a few excerpts from other companies in 2013 (emphasis added): 
IBM: "We strive to lead in the invention, development and manufacture of the industry's most advanced information technologies, including computer systems, software, storage systems and microelectronics. We translate these advanced technologies into value for our customers through our professional solutions, services and consulting businesses worldwide.•'

McDonald's: "McDonald's brand mission is to be our customers' favorite place and way to eat and drink. Our worldwide operations are aligned around a global strategy called the Plan to Win, which center on an exceptional cus-tomer experience—People, Products, Place, Price and Pro-motion. We are committed to continuously improving our operations and enhancing our customen' experience."4' Procter & Gamble: "We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world's consumers, now and for generations to come. As a result, consumers will reward us with leader-ship sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our shareholders and the communities in which we live and work to prosper." 41 
These are all perfectly reasonable, responsible missions. But two things are immediately obvious from reading these. First, I owe you an apology for making you slog through corporate mission statements, perhaps the worst form of literature known to man. Second, Google's mission is distinctive both in its simplicity and in what it doesn't talk about. There's no mention or market. No mention of customers, shareholders, or users. No men-tion tion of why this is our mission or to what end we pursue these goals. Instead, it's taken to be self-evident that organizing information and making it accessible and useful is a good thing.

This kind of mission gives individuals' work meaning, because it is a moral rather than a business goal. The most powerful move-ments ments in historymoralhave had  motivations, whether they were  questi %r independence or equal rights. And while I don't want to push this notion too far, it's fair to say that there's a reason that revolutions tend to be about ideas and not profits or market share.

Crucially, we can never achieve our mission, as there will always he more infornia—tiVnio-oifinize and more ways to make it use-ful. 'ibis creates motivation to constantly innovate and push into . new areas. A mission that is about being "the market leader," once accomplished, offers little more inspiration. The broad scope of our mission allows Google to move forward by steering with a compass rather than a speedometer. While there are always disagreements and we'll get to a few of those in chapter 13 the underlying shared belief in this mission unites most Googlers. It provided a touch-stone for keeping the culture strong, even as we grew from dozens of people to tens of thousands. One example of our mission pushing us into unexpected areas is Google Street View, which was introduced in :oo7.4• Its simple but mind-bogglingly expansive purpose was to create a historical record by documenting what the entire world looked like from street level. It built upon the success of Google Maps, which in turn was built on the foundation laid by John I lanky and Brian McClendon, who started a company called Keyhole in 'mot that Google acquired three years later (and who are both still vice presidents at Google). 
A more traditional mission of creating value fur customers or growing profits would never have led us to Street View. And it's a far cry from counting backlinks in order to rank websites. But our broader mission provided the space for Googlers and others to cre-ate wonderful things. These bursts of creation and accomplishment were a direct result of articulating Google's mission as something to keep reaching for, just beyond the frontiers of what we can imagine. The most talented people on the planet want an aspiration that is also inspiring. The challenge for leaders is to craft such a goal. Even at Google, we find that not everyone feels the same strong connection between their work and the company's mission. For example, in our lox; survey of Googlers, 86 percent of our sales teams agreed strongly that "I see a clear link between my work and Google's objectives," compared to 91 percent for other parts of Google. Same mission. Same company. Different level of connec-tion and motivation. How do you address this? Adam Grant has an answer. In Give and Take, he writes about the power of purpose to improve not just happiness, but also pro-ductivity? His answer, like many brilliant insights, seems obvious once it's pointed out.  

 

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