May 26, 2006 | Friday
Report from Google Zeitgeist
By Dylan Thwaites, CEO in Company News |Latitude People |Events |Search Engines |Google |Search Expertise
Earlier this week I found myself at Google Zeitgeist 2006. Zeitgeist is a German word that translates as “spirit of the times”. It was Google’s second ever Zeitgeist event; the objective is to bring together about 150 industry leaders to listen and debate with world class keynote speakers. The event lasted two days and was hosted at The Grove, Hertfordshire.
Coincidentally, the only other guests in this uber-trendy country estate hotel were the England football team – so the marble and leather reception hall had the surreal mix of David and Victoria Beckham asking for directions to the spa complex, while Sir Martin Sorrell (CEO of WPP) - with an entourage bigger than Becks - Blackberried his empire. Meanwhile, Larry Page (Google co-ounder) wandered around looking like he’d just woke up and wasn’t supposed to be there, and in the corner musician Peter Gabriel, now old, grey and benevolent discussed how we can help the Third World.
The event is billed as top secret.
We were expressly briefed that we can only blog on two sessions – the opening remarks from David Cameron (Conservative Leader) and what was described as a fireside chat with Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google. Everything else is off the record.
So let me tell you about David Cameron.
I had been expecting to dislike Old Etonian Cameron. On TV, he seems to try to out-Blair Blair in all the things we hate about Blair – smarmy, trite soundbite politics. To be honest I viewed him as bit of a fake. However, it is clear that in the flesh he is a great presenter, engaging and appeared to me to be entirely genuine.
At first I was confused, his speech was littered with talk about General Wellbean – what? Some military figure I’d never heard of? No dear simple voter, let the ever helpful David explain it in abbreviations of three letters - GWB – General Well Being - under the Tories GWB would be viewed with as much importance as GDP. He argued that work and wealth are not everything and that things like health, leisure and family are at least as important.
I think he is on strong ground here – most people would be with him to this point. But crucially, this being politics, it is not the what but the how? We need to understand how a Conservative Government would make this happen. David says, “Exhortation over Regulation”. This is hardly a good chant to take to the streets, but it is damned good Government. Instead of legislating to force businesses to change against their will, persuade them why it is beneficial. The best companies will do this and the worse will go out of business as they lose their best people. It doesn’t necessarily mean putting in crèches and funding gap years, it is about aligning the aspirations of your teams with the goals of the business.
At Latitude we work really hard, so we employ people who are capable of working really hard, people who are driven by the need for high performance, winning, and personal responsibility. We don’t tolerate weak links within the business; we train constantly and expect our leaders to be world class motivators. Yet, at the same time we fund Latitude Clubs to support the out of work passions of our people – from the Spa and Relaxation Club to the Business Book Club. Every month we fund more clubs - Badminton, Climbing and Football, for example. We treat each other as family, so in times of need the support is there, not because of legislation but because we care. The result is that 84% of our staff in an anonymous employee survey said that they look forward to coming work in the morning.
So Cameron’s exhortation argument works for me. A good read on this is Happiness: Lessons from a New Science by Richard Layard. Where did I come across this book? In the Latitude Business Book Library. Karma.
Final thought: Do you cause happiness wherever you go or whenever you go?
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