What Makes a Great Team Member? This is so true! Our project management team, and some other people I know fit this description pe...
Google trying to avoid an “Office Space” moment
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The Wall Street Journal is reporting Google has developed an algorithm to help it figure out which of its employees are most likely to quit, so it can use that information to help retain them. Kinda makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside.
Employee retention is unquestionably near the top of the list of concerns at a company like Google. Its employees are, for the most part, the company. But, as the Journal points out, Google has gone from a high-flying upstart to having 20,000 employees. A big shift like that can take its toll on a company's culture and there have been a number of notable departures recently, including to Twitter and Facebook. It's easy to surmise that at least part of those departures were due to a longing for a startup atmosphere and to avoid feeling like a cog in a massive machine. Or they were over power and money. That's always possible.
There's probably no better depiction of the worst of modern corporate culture than the 1999 cult movie classic "Office Space." I couldn't help but think of this exchange between the main character Peter Gibbons, a computer programmer no less, who has become disillusioned by the over-management at the company he works for, Initech, and two consultants, "The Bobs," who were brought in to help figure out who to lay off (Thanks to IMDB.com for having a list of memorable quotes so I didn't have to transcribe from the DVD, though that wouldn't be such a bad way to spend part of the day).
Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.
Bob Porter: Don't... don't care?
Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime, so where's the motivation? And here's something else, Bob: I have eight different bosses right now.
Bob Slydell: I beg your pardon?
Peter Gibbons: Eight bosses.
Bob Slydell: Eight?
Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means that when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled, that and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.
Now, this isn't exactly the problem currently facing Google, but kudos to management there for taking steps now to make sure it doesn't get that way.
Part of me, however, does wonder - and fear - at the dependency on statistical models to determine who's unhappy. (I understand that Google is taking other steps to solve this problem, but let's just focus on this one)
Now suppose an algorithm is used in place of The Bobs. Instead of using the algorithm to find the employees who may be underperforming because they're unsatisfied and then try to figure out ways to better use them, Google just uses it to find who is underperforming.
Google, of course, has every right to do that. Heck, it's probably cheaper than paying McKinsey to do it for them. But it puts that precious Google corporate culture at risk by dehumanizing its most important commodity.
So I hope as it develops this new human resource tool Google follows its unofficial corporate motto:
Don't be evil.
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