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Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

(qz.com)
581 points antr | 2 comments | 16 Aug 13 12:09 UTC | HN request time: 0.515s | source
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hvs ◴[16 Aug 13 13:17 UTC] No.6223772[source]▶
Six months after he took the reins, Page announced that Google would adopt a “more wood behind fewer arrows” strategy that would put more of Google’s resources and employees behind a smaller number of projects.

There's nothing more soul-crushing for an organization than a board of directors.

replies(1): >>6223846 #
mattzito ◴[16 Aug 13 13:29 UTC] No.6223846[source]▶
I think it's not unreasonable for senior management at a company to say, "Geez, you know, we have our fingers in too many pies". Sometimes their logic is sound - they're distractions, they're consuming resources that could be used on core business ideas, we can shift innovation to a focused group of our core innovators. And sometimes it's not sound - it's purely about the dollars and sense.

But to argue that the board of directors is what's soul crushing about an organization seems odd to me.

replies(2): >>6224297 #>>6224775 #
1. jzwinck ◴[16 Aug 13 14:46 UTC] No.6224297[source]▶
"we can shift innovation to a focused group of our core innovators"

It might be easier to manage a separate Innovation Department, but what happens when someone on another team has a great idea? Do we transfer that person to the Innovation Department to continue innovating? What would that mean for their team left behind, relieved explicitly of responsibility, and implicitly of capability, to innovate?

Maybe the whole company should be tasked with innovation, but innovators should be allowed 80% time to write CRUD apps if they so choose.

replies(1): >>6224607 #
2. mindcrime ◴[16 Aug 13 15:32 UTC] No.6224607[source]▶
It might be easier to manage a separate Innovation Department, but what happens when someone on another team has a great idea?

Exactly. At the end of the day, anybody in a company can be responsible for a valuable innovation. This is why something like "20% time" is such a good idea in the first place. It avoids the trap of assuming that you can actually accurately select the people who "should" be doing innovative stuff.

OTOH, having a dedicated Research department where people spend 100% of their time on research and cutting-edge stuff also seems like a good idea. An interesting approach might be to have both "20% time" AND "Google X" but with a policy that allows the Hoi Polloi folks a chance to rotate through the dedicated research group on occasion.