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Agency perspectives - "Run As Fast As You Can Until You Hit A Wall"
Monday, July 12, 2010
Editor's Note: This spring Google hosted ThinkAgency, an event for senior leaders from creative, media and digital agencies to come together and hear about opportunities offered by Google's existing and emerging platforms.
Ben Malbon, Executive Director of Innovation, BBH New York attended the event, and shared with us his key takeaways. In part one, he reflects on what he learned from a panel discussion with three Google engineers, including the similarities between engineers and creatives, how product teams are able to stay nimble and function like start-ups, the importance of failure and the risks of planning too far ahead. Here's what Ben had to say.
It was a very good day, and I wanted to share how and why. Specifically, I want to pick out a number of themes: around how the Google engineers work and are empowered, around Googleʼs iterative approach to creativity, and around YouTube and where we – in agencies – might take YouTube next (the latter theme will be in my next post).
The Panel
Benjamin Palmer, CEO and Founder of the Barbarian Group moderated a panel of three Google engineers: Dan Sturman, an Engineering Director focused on keeping Google's data centers and back-end servers running smoothly; Fuzzy Khosrowshahi, a Staff Software Engineer who, with his partner, created the product that eventually became Google Spreadsheets (his team now handles cloud computing products such as Docs, Spreadsheets, Sites); and Tim Dierks, a Software Engineer who helped create Google spreadsheets, worked on the Print Ads product, and now focused on Google TV Ads.
At Google the engineers are the equivalent of our creatives – the most valuable and important people in the business. For many of us it was one of the first opportunities we'd had to see, hear – and question – the people who create Googleʼs products. Benjamin led the questioning but there was plenty of interaction from the floor, much around the theme of wanting more access for agency creatives to people like Fuzzy, Dan & Tim. In fact, I think putting engineers together with agency creatives and producers would be a highly fruitful exercise as far as driving new and more innovative use of platforms such as video and mobile is concerned.
How to remain small when you're big
I had imagined finding the panel most interesting from a technology angle – learning from the hallowed "creatives" at Google about emerging developments in mobile and search. But in fact it was the insights into how Google remains small, nimble, and like a start-up in approach (despite its size) that resonated most for me.
The engineers characterized the role of senior managers within Google as "getting out of the way" as quickly as possible to loosen, not tighten control over their teams. Equally revealing was that it is OK for mid-level managers to respond to questions from their seniors about what was going on with "I donʼt know, Iʼll go and find out." If you try and know about everything, all the time, on every project, youʼd harm the companyʼs ability to move quickly. Youʼd introduce friction.
It's ok to fail...if you learn from it
I was equally surprised at how open the Google engineers were about failure. I find it has become somewhat of a cliché for agencies to talk up failure; ʻfail fastʼ, ʻfail earlyʼ, ʻlearn to failʼ, and so on. Easy things to put on Powerpoint charts (especially during a recession), rarely have I seen them executed in practice.
So we heard the engineers talk not so much overtly about ʻfailureʼ as about the iterative approach they adopt to develop products. The mantra is launch then iterate. ʻFailureʼ becomes ʻlearning.' They described how theyʼd launch something, gauge the reaction, try again, gauge the reaction, and so on.
Surprisingly, for a business that seems to have so much on its plate, there was a warning around the dangers of long-term planning. One canʼt plan a year ahead; technology changes, culture changes, and sometimes the planning of it can take longer than the doing – thatʼs the biggest danger, you end up doing nothing because youʼre always ʻplanning.ʼ Again, more fuel on the ʻiterate and learnʼ fire.
Hitting the wall
The overall message within this section was around the folly of trying to second guess
reactions once new products were in market. Itʼs just too much for the human brain to compute. Much better to react swiftly once reactions are known, once the data is in.
Related to this was Managing Director Torrence Booneʼs observation around the prevailing attitude towards product development: "run as fast as you can until you hit a wall, get over it, and then start running again." Thereʼs certainly a pace and a conviction about how Google seems to approach creativity that I think many agencies demonstrate when at their best, but all too frequently we let the walls slow us down too much. Weʼre scared of hitting them too hard, maybe.
Stay tuned for the next post, in which Ben shares his thoughts on YouTube. To hear additional perspectives from agencies and others on innovation, experimentation and the direction of marketing, visit the
Fast.Forward. channel
on YouTube.
Posted by Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team
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