From Oil Change to Dance Troupes: Google's Dynamic Capabilities

I was recently involved in a process where an organisation wanted to generate ideas for new leadership practices. The idea was to get many in leadership positions to creatively present their ideas. Needless to say, the team members put in a lot of effort and many ideas emerged in the process. Some on the list met the response of, "We've tried this before" or "The MD doesn't want this".

This prompts me to contrast this with the deeply embedded practices at Google.

"We found someone who does oil changes here in the parking lot. That's not something that Google pays for. Employees pay for it. We just offer the space.", Anne Driscoll, Google's HR Manager, told FastCompany in a recent interview. Anne went on to explain the reasons for some of these internal people-focused services. They underline Google's commitment to their staff, "We're trying to make your life outside the office more efficient. We don't want you to spend three hours going to the doctor. Let's have doctors here on site so it'll take 20 minutes. Not because we want you back in your seat doing work. But because we don't want you to have to go home and do extra work because it took so long to go to the doctor."

They are also linked directly to Google's start-up and innovation culture. "[W]e bring in highly technical people, leaders in their field, who get together with a group of like-minded people to talk about those subjects. ... It fosters the ongoing learning culture here."

In a related article, David Glazer, Google's Engineering director, takes up the story. The founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, emphasize the quality of the staff and the degree of risk they are required to take. "If what you're doing has the potential to really make a big difference in a good way, then don't distract yourself or me by telling me how and when you're going to make money from it. On the other hand, if you have something that's clearly going to make some money over the next few quarters or year but won't be big and exciting, then don't do it."

This sense of empowerment, coupled with Google's renowned 20% own-time culture has set up a platform for innovation and creativity. You can see the establishment of a very special set of capabilities in this process; from the type of people that have been hired, the way they are brought into the organisation, and the tolerance for experimentation and failure.

The late Sumantra Ghoshal, identified three key capabilities that would produce entrepreneurial businesses; getting the right people to start with, building relationships that encourage individual development, and, thirdly, trying to connect individuals' activities and beliefs to the core vision of the organization.