Eight most important qualities of googles top employees

STEM expertise is a highly desirable quality in students entering today’s workforce, with the widely acknowledged view that these are the skills required for successful employment. There is however, a growing understanding of the value in possessing certain types of behavioural and interpersonal attributes for success in the 21st century workforce. The importance of these personal skills in relation to STEM direct expertise is the topic of investigation in today’s musing.

The attached article by education writer Valerie Strauss describes how multinational technology giant Google tested their STEM-only hiring approach by analysing hiring, firing and employee performance data accumulated since the company’s incorporation in 1998. The results were surprising to Google; amongst the eight most important qualities identified in the most successful Google employees, STEM expertise was found to come in last place. The top seven characteristics of successful employees were identified as the following:

• Being a good coach
• Communicating and listening well
• Possessing insights into others
• Having empathy and showing support for colleagues
• Being a good critical thinker and problem solver
• Being able to make connections across complex ideas.

These findings were significant for Google as they led to a rethinking of their hiring practices where qualifications and skills referred to as “soft skills,” once seen to be less relevant are now being viewed in a new light. Further investigation from another Google appointed study (coincidentally named Project Aristotle) looked at data from the most productive teams at Google. Similar findings ensued where soft skills including empathy, emotional intelligence (EI) and emotional safety came out on top as markers of the most successful teams.

From an EI perspective, we already know of the value of skills such as accurate and authentic expression of emotion in communication, understanding other’s emotions and viewpoints (including empathy), employing helpful emotions to achieve desirable outcomes and using emotional information for balanced decision making. These skills have been found to be beneficial for mental health, developing quality relationships, adaptive coping styles, pro-social behaviours, leadership and sporting behaviours in addition to academic outcomes. It perhaps should not come as a surprise then that research findings such as these point to the extended benefits of EI beyond formal education in preparedness for the workforce, organisational productivity and overall success in employment.

If you want to be a strong leader and manger, look no further than Google. Employing some of the best and brightest people in the world, Google has extensively researched their leadership and management strategy and discovered 8 qualities of their own great leaders-managers. According to Laszlo Bock, Google’s Senior Vice-President for People Operations (Human Resources), teams working under the best managers perform better, are happier and stay longer with the company. If you want to become an efficient and inspiring leader-manager, check out Google’s great leader’s qualities and why they are important to your business.

1. Be a good coach: have regular coaching conversations around development of your employees. According to recent research, the single most important managerial skill that separates highly effective managers from average ones is Listening to employees is key to effective coaching, as well as asking questions, focusing on positively moving forward and building accountability with employees.
2. Empower your team and don’t micromanage: If you micromanage your employees, you will never empower your team. When micromanaging a leader is drilling employees to become more dependent on them, as they will feel that they will need to ask permission for every tiny detail. Good leaders prevent employees from being excessively reliant on their bosses by allowing them to make their own decisions and the freedom to do tasks in their own way; cultivating a staff that feels empowered and self-guided.
3. Express interest in your team members’ success and well-being: Practicing empathy and listening skills will show employees that you are interested in their success and well-being, both in and out of the workplace. Have real conversations and get to know your employees and their story, everyone has one.
4. Be productive and results oriented: Ask: how can I achieve this? What do I have to do now to get there? How does getting the result feel? By asking yourself these questions as a leader you will constantly be moving forward. Plus, your team will respect you by seeing your productivity.
5. Be a good communicator and listen to your team: As many know, listening is a vital leadership skill and I have found that the best leaders are really the best listeners.
6. Help your employees with career development: Most employees don’t want to be doing the exact job they are doing now forever. Focusing on career progression and development within the organization will empower employees to stay at your company and not go looking for career advancement elsewhere. Remember, it is kudos to you and your skills as a manager when one of your team is promoted.
7. Have a clear vision and strategy for the team: A strong vision for a business can create energy and the drive needed to push teams and organizations forward. A strong and effectively communicated vision will be infectious, stimulating, and attractive to others. It will motivate employees to achieve business goals and aspirations. People rally around leaders with a compelling vision and a clear sense of purpose.
8. Have key technical skills so you can help your team: this is obviously a very important characteristic of strong leadership in a technical company such as Google, but can be applied to any industry. Having a strong background in sales, accounting, marketing, or real estate - whatever field you managing - will enable you to help your employees succeed.

For aspiring, new and experienced managers these qualities do not require a change in personality but rather is a matter of behavioral changes, which can be accomplished by regular and deliberate practice. Most importantly, as a manager the most important things you can do for your employees is to make sure you have time for your employees and to be consistent.

What makes a great leader Google?

Be productive and results-oriented. Be a good communicator and listen to your team. Help your employees with career development. Have a clear vision and strategy for the team.

What is Google's 20 rule?

The 20% Project is responsible for the development of many Google services. Founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page advised that workers "spend 20% of their time working on what they think will most benefit Google".

What qualities did Google learn its most successful employees possessed what about their best teams?

..... Project Aristotle shows that the best teams at Google exhibit a range of soft skills: equality, generosity, curiosity toward the ideas of your teammates, empathy, and emotional intelligence.

What makes a good Google employee?

Attributes like enjoying fun (who doesn't), a certain dose of intellectual humility (it's hard to learn if you can't admit that you might be wrong), a strong measure of conscientiousness (we want owners, not employees), comfort with ambiguity (we don't know how our business will evolve, and navigating Google internally ...