Book Review: Work Rules by Laszlo Bock

Imagine writing the biography of a sixteen year old. Could it be interesting to someone who is a stranger? Would the life lessons be useful to someone who is much older? Would the events of this sixteen year old inspire others for years together? The diary of Anne Frank (12 June 1929 – February 1945) certainly is one terrific example of a sixteen year old’s life that has inspired many people over generations.Google is also a sixteen year old. Should we use the same criteria to evaluate the life of a corporation? Google is not your average sixteen year old corporation. It has been a prodigy that has made search synonymous with its name. Today if you don’t know the answer to any question you simply “Google it”. They flout many rules of branding. They play around with the company logo every day. It is topical and intriguing and has its own fan following. Look for the Google Doodles <click here>Last year their Chairman Eric Schmidt wrote How Google Works a book that documented their approach to meetings, decision making and more. There is a nifty set of slides <click here> that capture several key ideas of the book. This book laid threadbare the hardware and architecture of Google.

The Source Code

Work Rules! Now lays open the source code of Google. Written by Laszlo Bock, Sr VP of People Operations for Google Inc. They call Human Resources by a different name – People Operations. The book takes the touchy feely stuff called organizational culture and decodes it. What makes Google top the list of Best Company to Work For across countries year after year? The book talks about all the way “they do things” at Google. Culture after all is just the way everyone operates (when your manager is not watching over your shoulder).

Manager Empowerment

If it is Google, the manager cannot make unilateral decisions about whom to hire or fire or rate performance, or decide salary hikes, or promote or product design or launch or rate software code quality. These decisions are made by a group of peers, a committee, or a dedicated independent team. So the managers have no way of exercising traditional means of authority. That is one of the cornerstones of the culture that is spawned as a result of this choice.If there is only one reason for you to read Work Rules (and you must) then read it for the chapter on how to select candidates. Should you ask them open ended questions? There are millions of websites that coach you on how to answer questions that interviewers at Google have asked. “How much does the Empire State Building weigh?” (Answer given here).Don’t trust your gut is the first lesson Laszlo offers. The best predictor of how someone will perform is a work sample test (29%). Give the candidate a sample piece of work that they would be expected to do.Then test the candidate for cognitive ability (26%). These are tests that have a defined right or wrong answer. The usual IQ tests are an example of this. Then use structured interviews (26%) where candidates are asked a consistent set of questions with clear criteria to assess the quality of responses. The companies need to write them, test them and make sure interviewers stick to them. Then continuously refresh them so that candidates don’t come prepared.Each HR process has to be backed by citing the relevant research followed by drafting the broad approach. The Google team continuously gathers data to assess whether the policy stands up to the stress test of their own culture and context.Who gets hired at Google’s People Operations? One third people come from traditional HR backgrounds and have high degrees of emotional intelligence. One third is recruited from consulting, and specifically from strategy consultancies, not HR consultancies. The final third of hires are deeply analytic and hold at least a Masters in analytical fields ranging from organizational psychology to physics. That mix may explain why HR policies are not based on gut feel and tradition but driven by research that is continuously refined after implementation.Work Rules is probably the best book written by a practitioner that backs each idea with theory. Read it and then ensure that your CEO reads it. If your HR head has not read it, you should be worried. After all Google is no ordinary sixteen year old,----------------Join me on twitter @AbhijitBhaduriWritten first for HR Katha <read original post>