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Google CEO Sundar Pichai Brings in Less Egotistical Leadership
- d_welsman 11y agoEgo is essential to breaking through those tough barriers and new opportunities. Disregard for risk. Is this really what is needed when Google is being criticized for falling behind its competitors in innovation.
- lumpypua 11y agoVic Gundotra's ego resulted in G+. If G+ is innovation, I don't want innovation.
- selectnull 11y agoYou might not like G+ but it IS innovation. Everything one does in slighly different way is innovation, if you don't want that, you would have to abandon pretty much everything except wheel and fire. I also don't think that creator's ego is a factor in product's success. There are many egotistical entrepreneurs with successful products. People might not like creators, but they like the product. So isn't the best strategy to let the market determine if something is worth it or not? I'm sure G+ has got its valuation...
- objclxt 11y ago> Everything one does in slighly different way is innovation No, it is not. If I decide to change the design of a bicycle to have square shaped wheels I have not innovated. I have instead made it objectively worse. I think to innovate is generally accepted as meaning to improve upon something in some way. I don't think G+ improved anything, as its abject failure in the real world demonstrates.
- slantview 11y agoSubjectively
- thetruthseeker1 11y agoI disagree. Was Yahoo search innovative? Google search came later and just did the search in a better way, but people still called Google search innovative! Yahoo search did make money with banner advertisements, and when that was doing well people called Yahoo search innovative. Innovation is used like a buzz word. Truly anything new, even if it is poorer than the previous product is innovation, it may not sell, but it is innovation!
- toyg 11y agoTo be fair, G+-the-product is not bad. It's G+-the-borg, the forceful attitude towards integrating other Google properties and establishing a source of truth for real names, that generated backlash and eventually doomed the project.
- saalweachter 11y agoThe forceful integration was the product. G+ was adding a unified social network to all of Google; hence, Google+.
- toyg 11y agoThat might have been the internal aim of the project, but to the user G+ was just another social network. In that sense, it wasn't a terrible social network. IMHO if Google had just kept G+ on its own (working hard on fixing the "ghost town" byproduct of evolved privacy features, and providing decent APIs), adoption numbers could have been lower in the short term, but the product would have survived in the long run. Integration with other Google products should have come naturally, not forcefully. Then we would have got a modern social network people actually wanted to join, instead of a tainted product stinking of corporate malfeasance.
- thetruthseeker1 11y agoI want to down vote this comment, looks like I can't. Sometimes success of a product also depends on being in the right place at right time. It is not binary
- chambo622 11y agoThat sounds like a non-sequitur. http://www.paulgraham.com/mean.html http://www.paulgraham.com/mean.html and http://www.paulgraham.com/safe.html http://www.paulgraham.com/safe.html come to mind.
- d_welsman 11y agoI wasn't equating ego to meanness, more a disregard of what other people think about them, not being afraid to fail also not to compromise their product to make everyone happy and ending up with a washed down product.
- lifeisstillgood 11y agoI think we fool ourselves into believing there is external pressure for quick, dirty, please everyone, "will fix it later" solutions when no one sane asks for that. Modern management is trying to apply command and control to creative endeavours, and usually forces everyone to fail. Sometimes it's possible to wander around, rejecting the views of everyone else and creating a perfect product. More often you get something no one wants. A better approach is to have enough time and money to walk in the right direction, carefully. No matter how many times I think of the idea of a start up running ahead I think of disorganised mob, not a disciplined army. The goal is to take a disciplined army into the unknown. not a rabble egged on by a crazy guy, or a goose.
- tomhoward 11y agoIn the sense that "ego" is understood in both psychology and spiritual circles, low egotism is associated with the qualities you describe. High egotism -> high conscious opinion of one's self (compensating for low subconscious self-worth), need for external affirmation of self-worth, and propensity for aggression and meanness in the pursuit of that affirmation. Low egotism -> content with self-worth, unreactive to external criticism or praise, willingness to do what is "for the greater good" regardless of short term challenges and resistance, trusting one's self to achieve the best outcome in the end.
- throwaway13337 11y ago
- Retra 11y agoI would consider "disregard for risk" to be the defining feature of bad decision-making.
- _nedR 11y agoI wouldn't conflate lack of ego with lack of drive or ambition or an averseness to risk. Especially for someone who went from a lower middle class family in one of the poorest states in India to becoming the CEO of Google. When a group of very smart people get together, there is a tendency for them to try to show themselves as being the smartest. This can lead to less-desirable situations where people don't share or cooperate as freely as they should. In the worst cases the situation could become antagonistic with individuals or entire teams and departments refusing to talk to each other. Now in a group of smart people, walks in a person like Sundar Pichai, someone without ego, who always defers to the other person, who might put himself/herself down to make the other person feel better. When two people in the group get into a conflict on an issue (remember this is a group that can get into religious wars over which brace style to use), it will be that person who mediates and gets the team going again. When the team has to vote on a new leader, that person is likely to get the most votes because he/she is the person everyone has the least issues with. Such a person who avoids conflict is able to act as transcendental force. People are more willing to listen to such a person or do what he/she says because they don't feel threatened by him/her. Someone like Steve Jobs who always puts himself above everyone else, could also act as a transcendental force as long as people agree to that. But if someone like Steve Jobs was to start at the bottom of the organisation, and moves up the ladder to its top position, it would be by putting other people and teams down. These people might harbour a grudge or ill-will and be less likely to do what the new boss says. It is not a strategy without its downsides (For example why did someone as incredibly gifted as Steve Wozniak end up leaving Apple?). By promoting similar people to leadership positions, Pichai is creating a environment where people with great talent but less taste for politics can also get their voice heard. I think such an environment is good for creativity to flourish. "A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit."
- kraknahs 11y ago"Especially for someone who went from a lower middle class family in one of the poorest states in India to becoming the CEO of Google." Not to take anything away from Sundar Pichai's accomplishments, but Tamil Nadu, from where he hails, is decidedly not "one of the poorest states in India." It has the second largest gross state domestic product in the country. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Tamil_Nadu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Tamil_Nadu
- Sven7 11y agoSunder Pichai is boring.
- ckaygusu 11y agoI'm quite sure he is not working as Google's CEO to amuse you.
- ArekDymalski 11y agohttps://hbr.org/2015/09/the-best-managers-are-boring-managers https://hbr.org/2015/09/the-best-managers-are-boring-manager...
- DiabloD3 11y agoSven put this crudely, but he isn't wrong, nor has he said this explicitly as an insult; he has merely made an observation. That said, the CEO is also the face of the company when it comes to high profile companies like Google. Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon also share this trait. Having a flat out boring CEO isn't in there best interest; they need someone with the right amount of ego: not too little, not too much.
- kelukelugames 11y agoTim Cook can also be described as boring compared to Steve Jobs. As well as Satya to Ballmer. And I'm sure who ever succeeds Bezos too.
- justthistime_ 11y agoHopefully this will also happen at lower levels. The "I'm the smartest person in the world, because I work at Google" attitude is a reason I don't interact with/communicate with/contribute to Google-related projects. Their hugely inflated egos are just off-putting.
- rajeevk 11y agoSometime, Google employees also show this kind of attitude in their social life which makes other people hard to just have social interaction with Google employees.
- hueving 11y agoYes, one of the most annoying things you can encounter is a conversation at dinner with multiple Google employees. They will constantly mention that Google is working on something and then after confirmation with each other that it is still private, refuse to tell anymore details. It seems like it's encouraged in Google culture to brag but in a secretive manner to remind outsiders of what they are missing.
- jonas21 11y ago... or maybe they're really excited about whatever it is and want to talk about it, but also don't want to get fired for leaking something?
- david-given 11y agoThis is precisely it. Plus, Google's huge and has very few internal communication barriers --- nearly everything is open to everyone. So it's really easy to get into the habit of casually talking about internal products when talking shop. Then you notice someone nearby who isn't a Googler, and you go oh shit and stop talking.
- eropple 11y ago
- chippy 11y agoShouldn't this have the correct title "The New Google: ‘All the Assholes Have Left’" ?
- tomhoward 11y agoNo - it's clickbait.
- jsprogrammer 11y agoAnd the new one isn't? At least the original was from the article, instead of editorialized by the poster/moderator.
- Touche 11y ago> And the new one isn't? No, the new one isn't motivated to get you to click the link, and therefore is not "clickbait". It is editorialized, but that's a good thing.
- jsprogrammer 11y agoHow can text be motivated? It's still clickbait because it makes an unjustified, subjective judgement.
- dang 11y agoNo, it's the doc title, which makes it a legit original—indeed, it's what the HN bookmarklet selects by default. So adidash didn't editorialize anything. Also, no moderator touched this post.
- ExpiredLink 11y agoIt had that title few minutes ago ...
- dang 11y agoAccording to the logs, it was submitted like this and never changed. Perhaps you saw https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10438539 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10438539 on the /newest page?
- tonomics 11y agoThe article does rely on the stereotype of "highly analytical without any empathy". That's obviously not the case for everyone.
- nathanvanfleet 11y agoI think they established that though. The whole article is about how there are people with both high EQs and IQs being promoted. So they are kind of admitting to their existence. They also didn't downplay them as less analytical.
- makeitsuckless 11y agoI'll believe it when Google start acknowledging human being's desire for privacy as a real thing instead of a technical and commercial obstacle.
- raldi 11y agoWhat hypothetical actions would indicate to you that such a change were happening?
- endergen 11y agoI'm liking their moves towards the option to pay to get rid of ads. Like with Youtube Red and I believe there is this option for Google Ads too, though I doubt in practice this means they track anything less about you. It's a dangerous dance for them to start supporting new business models that are alternatives to their cash cows. I suspect part of it is them hedging against real backlash against concerns about advertisement as surveillance.
- gorhill 11y agoA "Privacy & Security" category for extensions in the Chrome store would be an interesting first move.
- simula67 11y ago"Page was known as a tough manager inside the search giant, peppering his team with pointed questions and cutting (though usually accurate) observations. “He could come off as very harsh,” said one person who has had many encounters with Page over the years. “Until you realize it was more that he was completely lacking in EQ. I mean, zero.”" How is asking pointed questions and making cutting observations equate to being unsympathetic ? If you care about succeeding, this type of feedback is invaluable. If you don't, then you are more likely going to use the 'he is not very nice' card to get out doing any good work.
- littletimmy 11y agoIt is possible to be pointed and direct with tact. It is called manners.
- simula67 11y agoAgreed, being tactful is a good thing. But what is implied in that statement is that asking pointed questions and making accurate observations ( which could be damaging to your beliefs ) equates to being an asshole.
- jsprogrammer 11y agoYeah, the only one who looks like an asshole in these quotes is the person going on about zero "EQ".
- walshemj 11y agoDepends HOW you do it.
- mike_hearn 11y agoPossible, but not easy. A lot of people interpret any feedback that boils down to "this work isn't good enough" as a personal attack, no matter how nicely it's couched.
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- programminggeek 11y agoI am sure there are a few left...
- NoCulturalFit 11y agoNo more McKinsey people?
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- tianlin-shi 11y agoI believe that truly intrinsically motivated people will keep love what they are doing and power through the criticism.
- thetruthseeker1 11y agoBeing Egotistical shouldn't be conflated with being an Egotistical Asshole. Ego if used in the right way can be a powerful force for the better. America's moonshot was a collective ego of an entire nation that led them to achieve it. I watched an interview by Charlie Rose of Google's operation guy called Lazlo, I thought it was a great interview. He said having intellectual humility is important (does not mean less ego), which is the curiosity to learn or accept if you were wrong. Ego I am not convinced is such a harmful thing, and lets not say it is harmful just because many software engineers being introverts have a confirmation bias against it.