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Your Birthday Will Be Different This Year

Okay, so I've been away but now I'm back and figured I should start writing again.  There is a Very Long Story on why I haven't been blogging that perhaps I'll write a post on someday (but not today).

Has anyone noticed that this year everyone knows your birthday?  If you haven't had a birthday, you'll see what I mean shortly.  2008 is The Year That Everyone Remembers Your Birthday.  Just wait.  You'll see.  Between LinkedIn and Facebook (and probably some other things that I don't even recognize) everyone knows, which created a new experience for me yesterday (which was my Birthday).

So in actuality, my birthday was spent on an airplane flying from SFO to New York so I could attend a meeting at Google New York City the next day, and generally was not that eventful because I was away from my friends and family.  But I did make a new friend as I sat next to a woman on the plane named Erica Sandberg who happens to be a writer and wrote a book that sounds pretty interesting given that I'm a parent of young children.  She needs a blog (and I told her so) but then I'm barely a blogger so what do I know?  But if you are reading this, maybe you should visit her site and tell her she needs a blog and then maybe she'll start writing one. 

But what's interesting is that I must have received 50 emails from various people (some friends, some not so much) wishing me Happy Birthday yesterday.  Which, you would think, wouldn't mean very much because half the people I barely know.  Except that it made me feel good all day as each little note trickled in.  And really it was a combination of emails (I think these were from the LinkedIn connections) and a multitude of people who wrote on my FaceBook Wall.    I think it was the collective birthday wishes actually were somehow additive in nature.   So, like 10 somewhat random birthday wishes is equal to one really thoughtful but cheap gift from a close friend in terms of my psyche.  (Or something like that.)  Which is an interesting economy in a world where we are all more connected.

So even though you wouldn't think that one little email saying Happy Birthday would create a human connection in today's day and age (it is just another email after all), it really did.

I wonder what next year will bring? 

Job Seeker Advice for the New Talent Economy

I’ve written and spoken a lot about the chasm that has been created between people outside of companies and the people inside of companies as a result of technology.  This is more than just the oft-noted resume black hole; it is a social phenomenon with regards to how companies and people interact.  Let me explain.

This nearly predates my career history, but as a job applicant before the Internet if you wanted to get hired for, say a marketing job at a particular company, you generally:

·         sent a resume via mail or fax in response to an ad in a written publication
·         called or returned a call from a recruiter (either at the company or an independent headhunter)
·         Called the company’s Job Hotline via telephone to hear about the available jobs and learn what to put on your envelope (Marketing Manager Job #2987) so your resume has a chance of landing in the right pile.
·         Called the front desk and asked to speak to a recruiter or someone in marketing.
·         Found someone at the company that you could network with to speak to someone close to the job.

I am fairly certain we don’t receive any calls to the front desk at Google saying, “Hi, I’m really interested in your company, can you tell me if you have any open jobs in the marketing department?”  This used to be the case at front desks of all major corporations however, and it wasn’t that long ago; 10-12 years maybe.

The irony in all this is that the ‘old system’ was no less efficient than the current system. This can be explained by the theory of compensating behavior:  it is now so easy to apply for a job that more people apply for many more jobs, which means that recruiting teams at companies across the world now have to review a significantly increased volume of unsuitable resumes, which creates monumental inefficiency in the overall system.

In the past, it took substantial amounts of work for an applicant to apply for a job, so the majority of applicants only applied for jobs that they actually really wanted, that they really felt suited for, and at company’s at which they really wanted to work.  It was so much work to apply for a job, applicants didn not apply for nearly as many as they do today.

Hiring managers were less selective 10-12 years ago then they are today, because the volume of candidates was less.  This is really a problem of economics:  we have lowered the cost of job advertising and resume submission so much that we now have a systemic problem of resume and job ad spam.

There have been a lot of studies done on compensating behaviors.  One of the more interesting is that taxing the sale of cartons of cigarettes doesn’t lower nicotine consumption.  Smokers in more heavily taxed states simply smoke fewer cigarettes but that have more nicotine than those in states with lower taxation.  People change behaviors to compensate for changing environment factors.  This is what has happened in the recruiting industry.

Similarly, I would argue that job applicants, on average, invest the same amount of work effort to find a new job as they did before the Internet.  Because it is now so easy, the volume of applications are much greater, but the overall work effort per applicant is the same.  What has changed significantly is that the work investment and commitment level of an applicant to a particular job opportunity has been dramatically reduced.

The best way to understand this is that if you apply for only 1 job, and it is the only job you really want or know of, or are qualified for, you are going to spend a large amount of effort trying to land that job.  For example, you might customize your resume to the particular job and company, you might invest a lot of time learning about the company and department by doing research and talking with people and you would most certainly follow up with a thank-you note afterwards.  But if you apply for 20 jobs, some degree of reduced commitment sets in, and you stop doing all those little things to try and win each of the 20 jobs.  In essence, many candidates do very little to win each of the 20 jobs, beyond the minimum resume submission and (maybe) some light interview preparation.

This is supported by my first-hand experiences as a career recruiting guy.  For example, I just wrote a post on this blog where I reference how few thank-you notes I receive as an interviewer.  Now consider another example:  I have had a work-related cellular phone for the last 10 or 12 years of my recruiting career.  I’ve interviewed literally thousands of people during that time.  I cannot remember a single instance where a candidate called me on that number, even though it’s been listed at the bottom of my email signature for the last decade or longer. 

Social norms related to job applicants have changed to the degree that most job applicants essentially do nothing to win a particular job.  The whole job search event has been commoditized.

Savvy job seekers can and should leverage this social dynamic to get ahead in their job hunt.   The place to start is to always do the basics to set you apart:

·         Invest time learning about the company and interview team:  At least do the basics.  An hour of research will make you more knowledgeable than 90% of your competition.  Do an internet search (please use Google) to learn in advance about the interview team.  You should be able to figure out what the business challenges are related to the job you interviewing for, just by doing a little work.  You’d be surprised how many people apply to Google and don’t really understand our business model or even many of our products.  It has been my experience that most candidates don’t do this.

·         Really understand the required qualifications: Take the time to really understand the qualifications for the job and map them to your qualifications.  If there’s not a clear fit, I would recommend really reconsidering whether you should apply for that particular job and instead spend more time finding one that is more suitable.

·         Always send thank-you notes.  In fact, I recommend sending two thank-you notes, one via email directly after the interview, that also includes a relevant additional question or two related to the job (no fluff), and another hand-written thank-you note as a marketing impression to the interview team.

On the other side of the equation, as the talent marketplace continues to heat up and relative scarcity continues to play out, companies that are able to scale while preserving an authentic connection with the talent marketplace will win.  This requires foresight and commitment.

My Trip to Napa (and a Peculiar Example of Employment Marketing)

My wife and I were blessed with a babysitter this weekend, so we went to Napa to 'get away from it all'.  It has been a hectic couple of months with the move, starting the new job at Google, conquering the California DMV, finding a place to live, and generally getting settled in Northern California.  So off we went to Napa; neither of us had been before.

So I'm driving to the hotel after making a Starbucks run this morning, and I suddenly slam on the brakes (which is never really a good idea with my wife in the car) and stare at this corporate campus near the hotel, because they are displaying a banner that I found to be unique.  So I asked my wife to take a picture of it, and knew that I'd end up writing a blog post about it.  This ended up spawning a conversation on whether blogging was work-related or a personal hobby and whether I should even be thinking about it whilst vacationing in Napa.  This never really got resolved (which is it?)

But I did get the picture.  I blurred out the company name in the picture, but posted it here.

Download emp_app.jpg

What I found intriguing about this banner was I could not identify the intended audience.  Was it for potential candidates, as some sort of employment branding collateral?  Or was it intended as a reminder to employees of the corporation's commitment to them as they arrive to work every day?  Or maybe it was both.  It certainly was...blazoned in a highly conspicuous way. 

I couldn't tell, so thought I would post it here, and ask  "Why do you think they posted this banner?"   

I Learned About the Internet Yesterday

I thought I knew about the Internet but now I know I didn't really get it.  Which is pretty remarkable because I work for Google, am 36 years old (37 in two days), and have followed technology pretty closely.  I'm also a medium adopter, an investor in a Web 2.0 start up, and generally consider myself to be fairly in-the-know on this stuff.  I guess I have to play the, "but I'm only in HR" card to let myself off the hook (not too many times I can use that actually).

But today, I'm different than I was yesterday, because I experienced the reach of the Internet in a unique and very personal way.  One of my guest posts on Brazen Careerist got picked up on Wired.com, and then over to Valleywag, and then InformationWeek, and onwards around the Internet.  The number of hits to this blog, and to the Brazen Careerist site were substantial given the traffic patterns that developed.  Now, intellectually, I know all about the reach of the Internet and how it truly creates a World Wide Web, the theory behind The Long Tail, yada yada yada.  It was just so...mind-boggling... to see it happen, hour by hour, with the traffic counters spinning up and all.  When you are involved in it personally, it gives you a whole new appreciation for the power of the Internet.  I'm sure many other bloggers have experienced this sort of spike in traffic, but until it happens, I think it's hard to appreciate.  For example, here's a reference to that post in German.

So all of this is good and well, and there's a 'cool factor' to having something you created spread around the world and having others read it (although being called a douche by Valleywag readers was ...er...odd) but what is amazing is the personal connections it created.  I had authentic, very human interactions with people I may never meet that either commented or email me or generally connected with me.   

Blogging is such... a remarkable thing.   Ironically today it has left me at a significant loss for words.

I guess it's like this: Sometimes you hear about things that are big, and you see them and see that they are big, you rationally understand that they are big, but you don't really understand that they are big until you experience them.   

That's what happened when I learned about the Internet yesterday.

 

Netflix Prize: Stories in Stories, Part V

In my continued following of the Netflix Prize, I popped over to the Netflix Leaderboard again tonight, and there are now 21,076 contestants competing for the prize, from 140+ different countries.   That's 50% more contestants added to the captive pool of software development talent they have gathered since November of last year (only 4 months ago).  From a talent acquisition perspective, it's fascinating that the momentum continues to build even after the media buzz has worn off. 

The group that I interviewed in a previous post (see the categories at right to review the history on this topic) has dropped to number 5.   

Many companies pay for referrals of talent through employee referral programs and also external programs such as H3, or simply by buying research (essentially lists of names) from recruitment companies.  Buying names can be expensive, and good researchers will charge $100 an hour for their work (sometimes more).  Many companies pay thousands of dollars per successful referral.  It is interesting that on a per name basis, each software developer that is working on the prize cost Netflix less than $50 apiece (assuming the $1M is the all-in cost - which it probably is when you consider net present value; ie they haven't had to pay anything yet). 

The teams are nearly 70% of the way to the 10% improvement goal of improving the Netflix collaborative filtering engine. 
 

On Hedgehogs

I've been thinking a lot about value creation and creating a link with the customer. I think it's because I've been reading this really great book from the 1990's called Lean Thinking.  It is a great book and applies to recruiting in ways that are highly relevant but not readily apparent.  Now, I know there is a whole new iteration of TQM/Six Sigma/Lean/Whatever the Next New Thing of This Decade Is but applying these principles to an HR value stream has the potential for huge returns.

I can trace a large portion of my success as a recruiting leader of large corporate recruiting departments to Hedgehogs.   Or, more specifically, to the idea of a Hedgehog Concept.  My team at Starbucks I'm sure got tired of me talking about hedgehogs.  I actually have bought little stuffed hedgehogs for everyone on any of my teams, for the last 5 years of my career, because I believe the idea is paramount to driving organizational success.  So I guess I'm a Hedgehog Zealot.

The principle is simple, but it seems like so many organizations get it wrong.  I think it's rooted in human nature to get it wrong and overthink things based on faulty assumptions.   The idea of a Hedgehog Concept is to really understand, in foundational terms, how doing X drives the economic engine of the organization (or the customer).  This is where a lot of HR departments go awry.  For talent acquisition departments, it is really clear that we drive the economic engine of the company by delivering the best talent, for the lowest cost, in the shortest amount of time.  It is really that simple. 

But what inevitably happens is organizational inefficiency sets in (like a cancer) because people make decisions based on faulty assumptions, which creates huge waste in the talent supply chain.  Pretty soon people have completely lost track of how they drive the economic engine of the company, and productivity is replaced by activity, much of which creates no economic value.  Having a very clear Hedgehog Concept helps prevent this.

One key to driving organizational success is distilling the Hedgehog Concept down to the level of each member on the team, so that their efforts in turn map only to organizational value creation, and not to ancillary activities.  In many ways, this is the differentiator between top talent and average talent:  top talent can always see the hedgehog concept in any pursuit, and they are able to strip away the unnecessary activities and focus on the value creation.  That's why they get more done than their counterparts to the left on the bell curve.

Spending time doing a deep dive to understand value creation for the customer is one of the most productive things you can do when defining strategic direction.   

 

The 12 Phases of Becoming a Blogger (for an average guy)

So it's been awhile since I've posted, but mostly because I've been guest-blogging over at Brazen Careerist so it's not for lack of effort on my part.  I've actually been writing a lot, in fact.  Just not posting here.  It's interesting to be writing on someone else's blog, as it creates a whole new dynamic for me.  It's a little strange really. 

I think many bloggers like me go through a series of steps in their blogging career.  I'll call them The 12 Phases of Becoming a Blogger (for an average guy).

1. I can't do a blog.  I'm not qualified.
2. I could do a blog, but no one would read.
3. If I did do a blog, some people would read.
4. Once I started a blog, I would run out of things to write about.
5. I'm going to try blogging, but I don't know how to set it up.
6. People would probably help me set it up, so I'm going to try and do this.
7. I now have a blog, and it's hard to fit writing into my life, but I think about things diferently.
8. I've been writing a little bit, and I'm running out of things to say.
9. I'm starting to fit blogging into my normal weekly routine.
10. I have way too much to write about that I no longer have the time to write about everything I want to say.
11. I've met a few people through my blogging.
12. Blogging has changed so much about my life.

At least that's how it went for me.  Every step for me in my blogging experience has been from other people pulling me into the blogosphere.  In that, blogging is unlike so many other things in life.

I had a pretty funny example of Radical Transparency happen to me today while in a meeting with my executive team at Google.  We were having an offsite at The Four Seasons Hotel in Palo Alto, and discussing the strategic direction of the Online Sales and Operations group and some other topics.  At one point we got to talking about the people side of the business, and the idea of employee engagement.   Google's employee base is a pretty happy bunch of people, as that's why we won the top spot on Fortune's 100 Best Companies to work for in America this year. 

So I'm new, and trying to make an impression and generally contribute to the discussion, even though my head is spinning from trying to get up to speed in my new job.   And then right in the middle of the meeting I say, in my most profound voice, "Someone once said that most jobs are too small for the human spirit..."  Now, I really believe this is true.  And apparently, it really resonated with the team, because a bunch of the leaders in the room were nodding their heads and asking me to repeat it so they could write it down. 

So here's where it get's funny.  One of the leaders says, "Hey, let's find out who said that..." as in, let's found out what famous person coined such a remarkably insightful proverb.  So I think nothing of it, and 1-2 minutes later, this guy starts laughing and says, "I found out who came up with that quote."  And everyone looks, and he points at me.  The only reference on the entire Internet to that specific phrase is by yours truly in an interview with Jason Goldberg a year or two ago.  You can see for yourself here.

So, you have to be careful what you say in a Radically Transparent world, in more ways than you might think.

The Value of Love Bombs

There was a good post by Alex at Emurse last week on the value to candidates in writing personalized thank-you notes to the interview team after an interview.  It was particularly timely, as I received the best thank-you note I’ve ever received in my recruiting career that same week. 

Based on my personal experience, less than 10% of all candidates bother to write thank-you notes after an interview.  Even in this high velocity, high volume, transactional job market, this is surprising in that every candidate has invested a lot of time and energy to make it to the interview stage in the evaluation process and to ignore this opportunity to create an impression is most definitely a miss.  It certainly should play at least a small role in an overall strategy to land a job. 

The note I received was from a Stanford MBA that will be joining my team at Google to help with recruiting initiatives as an intern for the summer.  As an HR guy, landing a Stanford MBA to focus on recruiting initiatives makes for a Pretty Good Day.  She was a standout in the interview process, and very remarkable in the way she presented herself overall.  It is not at all surprising her follow up was also exemplary.  I’ll call her Shelly (not her real name) since she might not appreciate me blogging about her career plans. 

Alex’s post caused me to reflect on why Shelly’s thank you note made an impact but also my broader perspective as a corporate recruiting leader on the value of these little gestures.  I’ve referred to them as “Love Bombs” since as long as I can remember… I think it’s something I picked up in the early days of my recruiting career.  As in, “that candidate sent me a really good little love bomb after that final round of interviews…”

Thank-you notes matter for a lot of reasons.  They matter for all the standard reasons (showing commitment, business etiquette, etc) but I think they matter for two other  reasons as well. 

Reason 1:  As part of an overall strategy, thank-you notes are a way for a candidate to extend the engagement level of the interview process.  This is almost always a good thing if the candidate is in contention for the job.  A properly executed thank-you note via email will include some additional job-related questions that continues to perpetuate the candidate/interviewer relationship and dialogue.  I would actually recommend doing two thank-you notes, one via email with some additional questions, and one hand-written thank you as simply another marketing impression on the interview team.

Reason 2:  Thank you notes can convey a unique marketing impression that sets a candidate apart in the selection process, but also begins to advance a personalized relationship with the recipient, regardless of whether the candidate gets this job.  If they don’t win the job at stake, this personalized connection is valuable, and can lead to other opportunities in the future.  If they do get the job, it strengthens the relationships that ultimately are the bridge in the onboarding process into the new organization, which also pays dividends.  I can say the best thank-you notes I’ve received in my career created a nearly indelible memory of candidates I have interviewed… many of them still stand out in my mind today, and this after years and hundreds of candidates and interviews.  That is certainly worth the investment on the part of the candidate.

Shelly’s note was special because it wasn’t just a thank-you note.  It was hand-written in such a fashion that showed it was weighty to her:  carefully scripted and flowing in a way that suggested it was written with great care; not scribbled in the way of most hand-written business writing of today.  It was more than a message to say thanks, it was a recap of our conversation that showed a continued investment in the relationship, for purely the sake of investing in the relationship regardless of the job.  Yes, she expressed her interest and excitement over the role, but there was much more there than just a sales pitch.  It was the type of note that, coupled with her interview, would have solidified the relationship in a way that had she not got the offer, would have led me to call her for other jobs in the future should they become available and be well-suited for her. 

Shelly landed the job long before I ever received her thank-you note, but I think it is a great reminder that the little things, even in this day and age, really do matter.

The Difference between Jobster and In N Out Burger

Now that I am officially a Californian, I stopped by an In N Out Burger over the weekend and had a cheeseburger and a chocolate shake.  The restaurant I visited is right down the road from my corporate apartment of Castro Street in downtown Mountain View, and I was amazed at the quality of the staff that was working.  These people were friendly, attentive, and in genuine good spirits.  It was a unique fast food experience to say the least.  In N Out is doing something right when it comes to talent acquisition.

If you haven’t been there, In N Out Burger sells 6 items.  That’s it.  I counted.  Only six:  Burgers, Milkshakes (chocolate, vanilla, strawberry), Sodas, Milk, Coffee, and French Fries, as I recall.  $350 million per year of these 6 items by most estimates (they are privately held so we don’t know for sure). 

I couldn’t help compare this with Jobster, whose latest change of direction is buoyed with the assertion that they believe the value is in the match (as in the match between person and job), so we corporate recruiting types can now post our jobs for free.   Um, by definition, the value has always been in the match.  No value is created for either employer or employee if jobs aren’t filled and job seekers don’t land jobs.  Given that we are moving from the Search Era (everything available with the right query or question; a la Google search) to the Discovery Era (the right information served up to you before you ask based on complex algorithms, collaborative filtering, and historical data; a la the Netflix Prize or Amazon’s suggestive selling engine) this would be the holy grail of recruiting.   

The talent marketplace is not that efficient.  An efficient market would let us all know all the available, well-suited jobs that meet our criteria (location, compensation, job scope, company profile, leadership team, culture fit, the list goes on and is highly complex).   I envision this as my internet home page (currently Google with lots of widgets) serving up only the jobs that I might be interested in and also well-suited for.   Relevancy is very important, as there are already too many candidates pursuing jobs they won’t ever get hired for because they cannot discern whether they are well-suited for the role.  Similarly, the best talent doesn’t want to be solicited for jobs that don’t suit them any more than I want Amazon.com to recommend something that I’m not really interested in (which they annoyingly do by the way). 

This is a huge challenge for Jobster, and I’m not optimistic that they will be able to pull it off for several reasons:

1.) Complexity:  Creating relevant matches between jobs and people is one of the most complex algorithms I can think of.  Amazon can’t even get relevant matchng  right and they know a lot about my preferences for books and music.  It’s not clear to me how Jobster will be able to create relevant matches (and they must be relevant) by matching the multifaceted, multidimensional requirements of jobs with the multifaceted, multidimensional requirements of human beings. 

2.) Range restriction:  People don’t want to change jobs that often.  Yes, the velocity of careers has accelerated to where the average person changes jobs every couple of years, but in reality, there’s not a lot of time window when non-job hoppers really want to hear about other opportunities.  This makes the data set smaller.  For example, if you only order one book every 2.5 years, Amazon’s not going to serve you up much of a relevant menu.  Funny anecdote:  the week after I started with Google, I got a call, in my office at Google, from a headhunter about a head of staffing job at Home Depot after the Nardelli Implosion. Talk about poor relevancy matching…

3.) Unclear job specifications:  Those of us in recruiting know that the key to an efficient and ultimately successful search is really qualifying the requisition with the people responsible for making the hiring decision.  Very few hiring managers have thought through what really drives success in a job, and generally don’t develop a robust specification for the job.  This complicates things even further.

I’ve alluded to this topic a few times, but simplicity forces value creation, whether it is running a recruiting department, a burger chain, or a software company.  Admittedly, I’ve only done one of these.

What I have done is made a career out of observing and assessing behaviors, competencies, and the subsequent results of executive leaders with whom I’ve worked with at both large companies like Starbucks, Microsoft, and Google, and at the small 50-person start-up Oracle technology consulting company that my team and I helped rapidly scale in the late 1990s.  I have become a student of competencies, behaviors, and their resulting impact on business results.   

One of the key behaviors I see effective leaders consistently dispay is to separate the productivity from the activity in their pursuits, and winnow that down to clarify business results around a single, well-defined objective.  Generally, things aren’t as complicated as we make them.   I haven’t seen Jobster create this level of laser focus around a business problem that can clearly be monetized.

I mentioned in a previous post that I didn’t know what business problem that Jobster was trying to solve.  Unfortunately, now that I know and as much as I want them to succeed,  I am no more optimistic about their probability of success.  It will be interesting to follow their latest tack. 

The Post I Swore I Would Not Write

I've had a lot of conversations about blogging in the last 6 months, in particular with thought-leaders in the space like Jason Davis, Penelope Trunk, and other people who are much smarter than I regarding this topic.

Everyone told me that the key to blogging and getting read is to write often.  I knew right away that wouldn't happen, particularly given the fact that I have 2 young children, a demanding job, a long commute, a personal life that involves a lot of reading and some motorcycling when I can swing it, but I convinced myself that I could at least do 2 posts a week.  When I looked around, I saw a lot of bloggers writing much more than that, but many of the posts were not that substantial.  Because of that, I swore I wouldn't ever write a "Jason's Top Ten" post or something trite along those lines.  I'm not really that concerned with SEO or extending my reach in every way possible.  Mostly I write just for for me.

So now it's been a week or two since my last post, so I'm breaking my own rule, but part of the reason is that I've been commuting from Seattle to Mountain View, CA every week for the last couple of weeks until I relocate permanently down to sunny California.

In no particular order, here is my list of 'top things' from the last 2 weeks, in no particular order.  Lame, I know. 

• Always rent a car using a Visa Credit Card.  By doing so, you gives you car insurance up to the replacement value of the car.  Thelma and Louise come to mind.  This link gives you the skinny.  I know this because recently I've been renting cars like there's no tomorrow and inadvertantly provided Hertz with some free customization to one of their Gold-colored Pontiac Grand Prix's (there is nothing Grand about this make and model of automobile incidentally).  I swiftly and cleanly removed the driver's side mirror from the vehicle while trying to navigate the parking garage in building #43 at Google on Day #2. 
• The food at Google is ridiculous.  Because it's so good.  Here's the deal with this benefit that unless you've worked here you might not understand: Yes, the food is gourmet.  Yes, it's fantastic and there are 12 different cafes on campus serving everything under the sun (I'm enjoying the fresh sushi a lot, and they were also serving Kangaroo one day but I didn't go for that).  But the really great benefit is it allows me eat healthy without having to be organized.  Yes, I can eat like a King and turn myself into a much larger Jason, but I can also easily grab healthy snacks whenever I want and it makes it easy to eat right.  This morning for breakfast I had fresh steel cut oats, an organic banana, some fresh grapes, and these really great healthy protein bars.  At Starbucks, I was never organized enough to pack a fresh lunch, and as a result, always ended up eating at the cafe on the 3rd floor (usually at Taco Del Mar - ugh).  Best of all, at Google it's free.  People of course will draw their own conclusions that it is a 'secret' tactic to make us all work long hours and never leave work.  I call it a brilliant value proposition for today's busy lifestyle, and one that lets one live in congruence with one's values (everyone values being healthy, right?).  Very cool.
• Relocation is a very busy process, and not much fun at all.  I would say it's right up there with college admissions preparation and mortgage loan processing.  Those of you who know me understand that 'attention to detail' and 'planning and organizing' these sorts of things are not my strong suit.  I am renting lots of cars, so Hertz loves me though.  Or did love me, until I wrecked their Grand Prix.
• Spending a significant amount of time at one company really shapes you as a person.  It is remarkable how my 5+ years at Starbucks has shaped my perspective on leadership, talent, business culture, and values.   This is a very positive thing.  I've been reflecting on this topic a lot recently.  There's an interesting dichotomy though:  while you are at a company, it really serves to define a lot of your approach to getting the work done.  Once you leave however, you realize that most of the paradigms, guidelines, and rules were really self imposed.  This is worth thinking about in regards to one's own personal and professional development.
• Bicycling is probably a good thing to start doing at my age.  A good friend of mine is formerly in the bike business and is friends with the Cannondale rep, and was able to score me a smoking deal on the Ferrari (or Corvette since Cannondale is made in the USA) of road bicycles, the SystemSix.  I used to ride road bicycles in my teens and early twenties, and have been pretty big into mountain biking for about the last 10-12 years, so it's cool to think about getting back into riding on the road.  I'm really looking forward to getting on this new bike - the technology is amazing these days - think titanium and aluminum and carbon fiber and complex frame geometry and you'll get the idea. I cannot believe the craftmanship that went into this bicycle.  It's a work of art, and weighs next to nothing.  I have to admit I am a sucker for buying more gear than I need.  I just love well-made stuff. 
• Exercise is critical for success on the job.  I really fell off the workout bandwagon the last 6 months, gained about 8 lbs, but recently have started back in the gym in the mornings.  There are lots of things that can get in the way of regular exercise, but I believe exercise is a force-multiplier when it comes to professional achievement.  Any time you spend exercising is repaid with interest when it comes to focus, quality of work, and getting stuff done.  You cant' afford not to exercise.  It's part of being successful in life. 
• Simplicity forces value creation.  This is a doosie, but I am becoming more and more convinced that the key to successful companies, recruiting organizations, and other people-filled dynamic entities is their approach to simplicity.  As humans, we overcomplicate things which really erodes our chances of success in our efforts to truly create something of value.  As a leader, I think one of the keys to being succesful is to break things down into simple components, and then evaluate those efforts by asking, "what economic value is this creating?"   This separates the activity from productivity.  When I'm not being lame I will probably write a post on this topic to further my thinking. 

Google is a great company, and I really think I'm going to like it here in Northern California.