Paper Topic:

Google

GOOGLE : DEMOCRACY IN THE WORKPLACE

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SUBJECT

PROFESSOR

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1 . Introduction

Google is considered one of the most dominating key players in the Internet . Besides their cutting-edge technologies , an intriguing aspect of this technology company is their unorthodox organizational structure Google has attributed much of their success to this , enabling their engineers to deliver technologies to keep them ahead of the competition

2 . Research Methods

Primary source will mostly be a questionnaire email-ed to Google 's press team , which is indicated in their web site . Google has

been known to be secretive about their technology , but quite generous on information about other things pertaining to the company . Other sources to compliment the questionnaires include books and case studies

3 . Organization

Google was founded in 1998 by two Stanford PhD students , Larry Page and Sergey Brin . Before this , they were already working on their novel search idea , called PageRank , on Stanford 's resources , which has become so successful to the point where it regularly brought down their school 's network

Fast forward to the present , their search technology , although it certainly has been improved on and tweaked , continues to dominate the field , at the very least based on their market share . Most of their revenues come from the advertisements displayed along with the search results , which are relatively unobtrusive

Besides search , they also have expanded with a slew of other web-based products like email , calendars , word processor , spreadsheet and others that makes them a one-stop shop for anyone 's Internet information needs

4 . Review of Literature

The Search : How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture . Book by John Battelle (2006

The Google Story : Inside the Hottest Business , Media , and Technology Success of Our Time . Book by Vise D Malseed , M (2006

Google Organizational Culture . Case study HROB041 from Icfai Center for Management Research

5 . Strengths

Google has always attracted the best engineers to work for them . One of their famous recruitment stunts was to post a puzzle whose answer is used as the web site address . This site eventually lands at Google 's job page

Google engineers are allowed , and even encouraged , to pursue their own wild ideas with pay . This is manifested in the famous 20 time rule where engineers can freely spend 20 of their company time for their own projects

Lots of company benefits like free food (everyday , free massages , etc

6 . Weaknesses

No clear career path for their employees , especially engineers . Usually companies have structures where employees can climb the corporate ladder , with jobs being more managerial in nature as one goes up

7 . Proposed Solutions

For the type of engineers Google hires , most have probably no managerial ambitions . All they would want to do is work on some great engineering projects with their mathematically / physical-sciences oriented minds

Since Google is still a young company , the question would be if their current organizational setup would survive the market demands in the future , say 10 years from now . It can be...

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