Google’s CEO Just Told a Disgruntled Workforce to Do This 1 Thing to Be Better. It Doesn’t Look Good

It’s been a tough few months for the big tech companies, Google included. Google’s Q2 2022 earnings showed a 13 percent year-over-year increase, and a small jump over Q1’s earnings, coming in at nearly $70 billion.

That’s right, $70 billion. What’s the problem then? As impressive as these numbers sound, you have to compare it to 2021, which saw a 62 percent year-over-year increase. Macroeconomic trends like inflationary pressures, central bank rate hikes, and geopolitical instability have put the pressure on big tech, and we’re seeing slowed growth as a result. Executives are trying to cut it off at the pass by cracking down, uncovering efficiencies, and streamlining processes.

According to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, the way to ride the wave is to become “more entrepreneurial.” Pichai reminisces back to Google’s small and scrappy days, when things were lean and productivity per headcount was riding high. 

Is it possible? For Google, the global technology conglomerate with over 150,000 employees, to be just that: more entrepreneurial?  

Startup mentality in big business: Doable? 

Startups have the startup mentality, that scrappiness that Pichai speaks of, because they’re small and new and nimble. If the executives’ solution to the productivity problem is to go back to the early Google startup days (in spirit, not in profit — they want to have their cake and eat it too, after all) then they’ll be disappointed. 

I hazard a guess that in six months they’ll be banging their head against a wall: “Why aren’t we being more like a startup!” The answer, in my mind, is simple. Because, Google, you aren’t a startup. Furthest thing from it, in fact.

In fields of organizational design and entrepreneurialism, there is talk about the 50-100-500 rule. First developed by Alex Wilhelm, an editor at TechCrunch, the rule says that if your company has a $50 million revenue run rate (12 months), 100 or more employees, and has a value of $500 million or more, you are no longer “entrepreneurial.” You are no longer a startup. You’re (like) Google.

Bureaucratic bloat

Beyond the numbers, another factor to consider is the one thing that most people in big organizations absolutely detest: bureaucracy. Walmart CEO Doug McMillon calls it “a villain.” Berkshire Hathaway vice chair Charlie Munger says its effects should be treated like “the cancers they so much resemble.”

Hated as it is, it’s an inevitable and necessary evil in the complex global economy in which our big businesses operate. “There’s no startup within a big company.” This is the word of caution from co-founder and former CEO of Waze Noam Bardin, whose involvement in Waze’s acquisition by Google made him realize there’s no way around it: Anything within Google is automatically anti-startup. 

If the answer to Google’s “productivity problem” doesn’t lie in its executives waxing nostalgic for the startup days of yore, then what is the answer? Time will tell. But the first step is for senior leadership to recognize what the company is, and what it isn’t.