Google has lost ground and could be brought down by a lack of urgency, a former employee who sold his company to the tech giant has argued.
Praveen Seshadri, whose company AppSheet was acquired by Google in early 2020, became an employee of the tech giant shortly before the pandemic.
The purchase price was not publicly disclosed, but TechCrunch reported at the time that AppSheet was valued at around $60 million.
According to Seshadri’s LinkedIn profile, he left Google last month after three years as a software engineer.
In a blog post on Tuesday, Seshadri attacked Google, arguing that the tech giant has four “core cultural problems”: lack of mission, lack of urgency, extraordinary delusions and mismanagement.
“It’s all a natural consequence of having a money printing machine called ‘advertising’ that continues to grow every year, hiding all the other sins,” he said.
‘Excellent company’
“Now, at the expiration of the three-year mandatory retention period, I have left Google to understand how the once great company has slowly come to a standstill.”
Seshadri said that while Google’s thousands of employees “can and are well compensated,” they are like “rats trapped in approvals, launch processes, performance reviews” and other bureaucratic procedures.
“The rats are regularly given ‘cheese’ (promotions, bonuses, good food, better benefits) and although many of them want to experience personal satisfaction and influence from their work, the system trains them to suppress their inappropriate desires and learn what that means. be “Googley” – don’t rock the boat,” says Seshadri.
Risk mitigation trumps everything else in the company, he says, which creates a work culture where approval is required from multiple people before decisions can be made and deadlines are unnecessarily extended. All important choices are made by senior leaders who don’t always have the expertise to create engagement, Seshadri said.
“[Leaders at Google] may claim and even think it’s better to slow down and do it right, but that doesn’t mean it’s done right – but it’s always done slowly,” he said. “Google can no longer seek success by avoiding risks. The way forward has to start with a culture change and it has to start from the top.
‘The delusion of exceptionalism’
Delusions about the company’s exceptionalism are so widespread, Seshadri also warned, that they have the potential to cause Google’s downfall.
“You don’t wake up every day thinking about how you need to do better and how your customers deserve better and how you can do better,” he said. “Instead, you’re so convinced that what you’re doing is perfect that it’s the only way to do it. When new people join your company, you indoctrinate them. You force them to do things because ‘that’s the way it’s done at Google.’
He suggested Google make three changes to transform itself: lead with a commitment to its mission, eliminate middle management, and cut out “peacetime generals who are condescending and can’t give.”
“Could Google achieve a ‘soft-landing’—that is, gradually transform and regain dominance as it continues to grow?” Seshadri thought.
“Most companies fail this test. Either they gradually wither and then linger on as a reflection of themselves, or they fail spectacularly. Microsoft can change, but it requires exceptional leadership and good fortune. Google has a chance and I will root.
Google did not respond fortuneQuestions about Seshadri’s blog post.
The company, which is currently in a race with Microsoft to develop high-performance AI for search engines, is caught in a “fragile moment” due to pressure arising from Microsoft’s recent breakthrough with its hot product ChatGPT.
“Most people see this challenge on the technological axis, although there is now a suspicion that it may be a symptom of a deeper malaise,” Seshadri said. “[But] Google’s fundamental problem is along the cultural axis and everything else is a reflection of that.
Earlier this month, Google’s parent company Alphabet saw about $100 billion wiped off its value after its answer to the AI chatbot phenomenon made a mistake in its first public event.
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