How Google can avoid becoming the next Microsoft, as told by an insider with knowledge of both
By Christopher Mims @mims August 30, 2013
The deeper you dig into the causes of Microsoft’s decade of stagnation and the departure of CEO Steve Ballmer, the more apparent it is that the problems Microsoft faced affect all large companies, to one extent or another. Fortunately for the world (and unfortunately for Microsoft) the company’s dysfunction drove away so many talented engineers and managers that they are practically climbing over one another to recount what went wrong in Redmond. Quartz has already written about how Microsoft veterans who left the company see its problems, and what they think needs to be done to fix them. But the observations of one of the veterans we spoke with are worth writing about separately—because of their implications for Google, the company’s most visible competitor. This person, who requested to remain anonymous, has inside knowledge of the workings of Google as well. Here are some of our key takeaways from talking with them.
1. Too many cooks in the kitchen will kill innovation every time
As a rule, decision-making grows exponentially harder with the number of people involved. In Microsoft’s early days, it was, like most young organizations, fairly flat in structure. A general manager oversaw 50-300 people, and decisions only needed his or her blessing. But in part because graduating into management is the only route to a promotion at Microsoft, the company added more and more layers of management. Read more of this post
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