Google product innovation in Canada, event in review

This week was definitely full of events, meetings and talks. I even missed a couple of interesting engagements. The “Google product innovation in Canada” event at Mount Royal University was one of the events I attended and it did stick with me.

The event took place at the Bissett School of Business on MRU’s campus. It was a great good networking opportunity. The room was full at about 70 people capacity. As they say, “when Google talks, you listen”. Yes, it was a promo event to get students excited about Google products and potentially interest them to seek careers at Google Waterloo. However, there were a few things that I found valuable in terms of organizational development and digital workplace.

• Google doesn’t hire experts. It hires personalities. Be ambitious, creative and wanting to change the world… and you are pretty much in.
• Google Waterloo is a fun place of over 100 people. The office was originally opened up for mobile development purposes. Over time projects grew and now one of the key initiatives is Chrome OS.
• According to the two presenters (Alex Coman, Software Engineer and Steven Woods, Director at Waterloo) Google has no traditional hierarchy. The initiative is coming from bottom up, which makes it an engineer driven company.

The event was put together by Google, MRU and Alex Bruton, Professor of Entrepreneurship at MRU. Many big thanks to presenters and organizers. This was certainly a valuable event to attend.