This was written ten years ago, but republished today. It’s a little dated, so I’m not going to argue whether Google is especially transformative today. Instead, I want to challenge a bit of the argumentation that those who work at high leverage companies are especially equipped to execute excellently.
His argument is that working at (insert transformative tech company here) during it’s hypergrowth years allows you to understand the motivations of exceptional achievers, and recognize what high performance teams look like. In the same way that being on a top sports team gives you great practice skills, working at a great company imbues in you an element of its culture.
This argument depends on a couple assumptions that I’m not sure are always founded.
First, and most importantly, that it’s apparent why a culture works. Many of the skills that can get a startup started may not be valued in the same way when a startup becomes more established. The importance of delegation and clearly delineated work may be more important at certain phases of the corporate lifestyle. A natural consequence of this is that former ‘Googlians’ may end up preferring a culture that doesn’t actually cultivate what’s needed at a given time. The process to build successful systems may not be the same process that maintains them.
A consequence of this, theoretically, is that focusing on Google during the tail end of it’s hypergrowth years may overrely on already-built moats, that are finally able to be capitalized on.
The second reason why I think timing matters is prestige-seeking box-checkers may be more likely to hired in hypergrowth eras, meaning that exactly the type of employee that has habits you want, may not be the one you’re thinking about.
This foreshadows the final assumption that I think might not be true, whether it’s easy to identify which teams and individuals are highly effective, especially in large corporations. Many upper level managers see the needle being moved as evidence of effectiveness, when it may be the case that discontinuing a certain pathway could be better, especially if the results aren’t immediately seen.
Criticizing this framework would be incomplete without providing an alternate hypothesis. Places that are able to be highly selective have some insight into what’s valuable. The people they hire are often conscientious and talented. Many of my peers who’ve primarily worked at transformative reputable companies are already these attributes. Working in an environment where they don’t need to babysit other members on a group project allows their productivity to rise to a more natural rate.
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