Reflective Journal Entry 2

Reflective Journal 2: Reflect on the working culture and management style in Google and Lenovo. (You may choose to explore how far their working cultures and management styles reflect their respective societies, share your personal experiences and opinions on your preference of working culture and management style, etc)

As the world progresses, Google and Lenovo have both become global brands in their respective technological fields. What is the secret to their success? Upon closer examination, it is evident that they have vastly differing styles of management.

Google’s working culture focuses on the benefits of autonomy and self-discipline amongst employees, as can be seen from the numerous company policies allowing for a high degree of flexibility at work. This is beneficial for the company as it creates space and a conducive environment for creativity and innovation to flourish, as it should. I also believe that by allowing employees to spend 20% of time on personal projects, they will be more motivated to finish company-allocated work in the 80% of time spent on structured work. This raises employee satisfaction, and with satisfied employees will come work of higher calibre.

Next, Google encourages dissent amongst employees, to voice their opinions and provide invaluable feedback to the managers. This helps to ensure that the perspectives of all are duly considered and the company can move in a direction supported by most, if not all employees. Personally, I feel that this managerial style promotes employee loyalty, as the employees are viewed to have equal status with the managers in terms of value and potential.

It does reflect the American society to a large extent. In America, human rights are more liberal and everyone is given the opportunity to express their own opinion. The individualistic and open-minded attitude evident from the country’s policies is very much akin to the free and easy style of Google. The strategies of the Obama administration may even have been adopted from Google’s company policy, in areas such as imposing a high entry barrier and depending on intrinsic employee motivation. However, Google’s success stems from the fact that its employees are disciplined enough to be able to concentrate on their programming work even with a host of distractions in the form of sports facilities, food and cosy offices. By contrast, the American populace is not as understanding of the numerous government-funded help programmes such as Social Security.

Lenovo, on the other hand, is largely based on a top-down managerial system, where the upper echelons of the company convey their instructions to those lower in the company hierarchy. The greatest strength of this system is also its greatest weakness; the fate of the company is based on a select group of people – the board of directors, who decide on what to do. On one hand, a capable board of directors can pass down orders to be executed quickly and effectively. This saves much time and energy as compared to the system of peer reviews employed by Google, where workers debate over the pros and cons of the projects of each individual. On the other hand though, there are many layers of red tape to cut through, limiting the company’s flexibility in policy changes. The top echelons are also far removed from those lower in the company ladder, and thus may not have as clear a picture of the situation at factories or individual outlets as the bottom employees. The system also hinders development of creativity in the workplace as less emphasis is placed on the employee’s opinions, limiting the influx of different opinions.

This system does reflect Chinese society to an extent. The political system is such that the China Communist Party (CCP) is the ultimate authority regarding most issues, leaving common citizens little room for debate or expression of their opinions. Indeed, they are brought up from young to not question the teacher’s opinion. Personally, I feel that this inhibition of innovation is very detrimental for China, as it should be drawing on the combined creative talents of its people in order to maintain itself as the world’s second-largest economy, instead of stifling creativity and thusly placing limits on its future success.

Although I would undoubtedly face many difficulties, I think I would prefer to work at a Google styled company.

I think that I would be an active contributor in peer discussions, being able to voice my opinion and defend it logically. I am also comfortable with the concept of questioning my superiors about the reasoning behind their decisions, and I can easily envision myself providing suggestions and feedback to my supervisor. In fact, I think I would love the prospect of being paid to be a voice of dissent. Furthermore, I would feel excited knowing that I was contributing to the cutting edge of research in my field, and that I would be working with peers equally well versed in my field of expertise. I would also feel satisfied knowing that the company valued my opinion.

Some people might contend that the lack of a creative faculty would be reason enough to work at a traditional company like Lenovo instead. However, I staunchly believe that this is the exact reason why I should work at a company like Google. Creativity can be cultivated, and I want to immerse myself in an environment conducive to innovation so I too may benefit. After all, if I work at Lenovo instead, I will simply be conditioned to follow instructions all the time – something I think I would not enjoy.

Thank you for reading!