Saturday, May 14, 2011

Google Case Analysis


Google is recently names as the 100 best companies to work for, and is expanding so far that it has to address is various issues regarding management of people’s operation, work-life balance and its international expansion which its rapid growth. Google is striving to try new practices of correlating personal traits as the basis for screening job candidates are geared towards hiring the candidates whose knowledge, skills and abilities provides the great match with clearly defined requirement of particular job. Traditional techniques ignored the specific requirements of job and were long and cumbersome process.
Correlating personal traits from employees answer to their performances as the basis for screening job candidates is geared towards hiring the person who is best suited for the specific organization culture. The hiring process is extremely time consuming and ambiguous as they try to identify the traits of that individual to succeed at Google. However, this whole procedure was so long and tiring that they lost many candidates in this whole procedure. Correlating personal traits as the basis for screening candidates reduced the chances of selecting the wrong candidates for the job and the time that they took with the old method of selection. It’s a good idea to correlate personal traits from the employees answers on the survey to their performances and using as a basis for screening job candidates match those of the current employees there is a little chances of selecting the unwanted ones and greater chances of fitting to the firms culture and requirement than those who don’t match the requirement.
            Yes, the benefits that Google has been paying obviously represents an enormous expense, Companies continue to face challenges in a globally integrated world, and thus are looking to their workforce to help them be more agile, as well as operate smarter, faster, and cheaper.  Enormous expenses on benefit are the key aspects of sustaining high performing employees who drove the organization to the position it is today. We need to consider it as an investment rather than the expenses to the organization, as a result of which we are able to attract the best applicants which is crucial for sustaining Google’s growth. Google is listed as 100 best companies to work that’s grown from three employees to 10000 employees and from 0 value to billions of dollars in about 5 years, which provides evidence for the support of  huge amount  on benefits that they have been offering. Moreover, achieving the right work-life balance is the centerpiece of Google’s culture and the company need to provide huge amount of money to support that kind of lifestyle like 24 hours operation, long hour’s operation and can also be much tensed. Google has to spend huge amount on benefits if it is willing to grow internationally, rapidly, successfully and attract and retain super-bright people.
The ability to attract and retain talent is rapidly becoming one of the key issues for human resource managers and their organizations across the globe. Hiring right people for the right job has been an important factor to succeed, for any organization, big or small. Hiring the brightest people is more difficult as the competition is more intensive and the brightest people are very scarce. High performing organizations are consistently outperforming their competitors on a number of human resource factors, including the level of teamwork and openness between co-workers, the training and development opportunities they offer to employees and the degree of pro-activity in HR planning. Developing this capability begins with the realization that effective human resource management underpins the competitiveness of organizations.
Recruitment and selection should include procedures should be directed towards the need and purpose of a position, the culture of the organization, and ultimately to select and hire the best person that best fits the position. Recruitment and selection policy should, then, be directed toward the following objectives:
  • Make the ability to attract and retain the best talent a top management priority.
  • Create the policies that enhance the firm’s attractiveness in the job market.
  • Make line managers accountable for the people they need and lead.
  • Hire the right person.
  • Conduct a wide and extensive search of the potential position candidates.
  • Recruit staff members who are compatible with organization’s environment and culture.
  • Place individuals in positions with responsibilities that will enhance their personal development and the growth of organization.
  • Provide best working environment with enough opportunities for learning and self-development integrated with career planning and mentoring.
  • Provide them with the best incentives, benefits and pay according to the organizational standards and performance.
  • Employee’s satisfaction and motivation are key aspects for organizational excellence.
As the company grows internationally, it faces considerable amount of challenges in terms of recruiting and building staffs overseas, performance, working in completely new set of values and ideologies and maintaining to the international standards and needs. Although, the international market is fertile ground for Google, growth momentum may be tough to maintain due to the difference in cultures, reward system, complete new environment, set of standards and spreading economic gloom as well. Advanced education about the market is needed to enter international markets. Most importantly, the organization has to take into considerations its legal and social liabilities while operating abroad. Things are not the same like they used to be in home, due to complete different sets of values, norms, beliefs, culture, international laws, social and legal responsibilities which should be considered while performing business in any places. The reason why one succeeded in United States may be the reason to be a complete failure in Japan. Google should consider all these factors as it tries transferring its culture, reward system and way of doing its operations abroad.
Every organization has its own sets of values, sets of beliefs and organizational culture. Similarly, Google also cherishes its own sets of values and cultures which took the organization to the heights of success and excellence. Google wants people with growth potential and provides financial benefits that supports the talents and maintain acceptable work life-balance. Google's emphasis on innovation and commitment to cost containment means each employee is a hands-on contributor. There's little in the way of corporate hierarchy and everyone wears several hats. Google should pursue some specific activities during new employee orientation such that they can get to know the values, beliefs and organizational culture, which helps them to set with given values and culture.
What key policies and procedures must employees be aware of on the first day to avoid mistakes on the second day? Concentrating on vital issues and such activities are to be pursued during orientation. What positive experience can you provide for the new employee that she could discuss with her family at the end of the first day of work? The experience should be something to make the new employee feel valued by the organization. Moreover, asking for the feedback about how effective orientation program was? The lack of one will make a significant difference in how quickly a new employee becomes productive and has other long-term impacts for your organization. These are some of the activities I suggest that should be pursued during new-employee orientation program.
In conclusion, this case beautifully addressed different challenges Google has been facing with its rapid growth and the various issues it has been facing while managing its human resource and people’s operation with its growth and international expansion.





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