4 principles of the organization, peeped in Google

When Google acquired Picnik photo editor in 2010, Director of Marketing Lisa Konkvergud (Lisa Conquergood) and the whole team Picnik moved into a corporation. They worked on their project until 2012, while in the Google does not decide to close Picnik. But the team believe in the original concept, therefore, left the corporation and launched a new website to edit photos online - PicMonkey.

During his two-year stay in Google Konkvergud I had the opportunity to gain experience and knowledge about the productivity and workflow in one of the most successful companies in the world.

Google main mission - to organize all the information available in the world. And within the company is organized really well.

Lisa Konkvergud

Although the start-up is much more mobile than a huge corporation, and Konkvergud PicMonkey team use in their work a few life hacking, which they borrowed from Google during his stay there.

1. Use technology to remote workers become closer

Google has a huge database of workers, in love with their job, and the company creates all the conditions for them to work on the level and continually improved. Google invents their own tools for internal use, some of which were later sold in public, such as Google Hangouts.

Google has offices around the world. It is therefore important to establish a link between people quickly and easily. Conference calls will not give you the opportunity to show colleagues something on his monitor. According to Lisa Konkvergud, Google Hangouts has been created to ensure that the employees had the chance.

In PicMonkey use Hangouts to meet with partners.

It allows us to stay in touch and communicate more personally, compared to talking on the phone. In less Hangouts settings for video calls, and less likely to make the occasional call. When communicating important to see the facial expressions and gestures of the interlocutor, and to include video in Hangouts, you can simply at the touch of the screen.

Lisa Konkvergud

2. Get rid of isolation

Every week, Google employees are asked to write a "snippet" - a few sentences about what they did this week and the plan to deal with next.

The idea is transparency. Everyone has access to the "snippet" of colleagues. If I was interested in cooperation, I can look into "snippets" and see if anyone is working on something similar.

Lisa Konkvergud

The small start-ups do not need to build a complex infrastructure to achieve the goals. Instead PicMonkey practiced 'daily roll ": workers talk about the three major tasks for the day and whether there are any obstacles to complete them.

As Konkvergud says, is the point of contact of each other. Transparency makes it possible to be always ready to cooperate and change rapidly.

3. Manage your incoming

The number of emails that Konkvergud received at Google, was stunning. And while the company has not taught employees use Gmail more efficient documentation and oral conversations helped save time.

One of my colleagues told Lisa about the existence of a button, which allows you to disable sound notifications from users who do not need to respond quickly. Konkvergud also use the tool to set priorities, which puts the most important mail at the top of the list. In addition, it is to use a filter to select the part of the message that needs to be tested in the coming week.

In PicMonkey Konkvergud also uses these tools, but choose the most important ones among the external members rather than in internal communications.

I get fewer messages, but now among them most important. External messages more frequently associated with the expansion of business, so I need to see them in the first place.

Lisa Konkvergud

4. Set goals before the meetings

Meeting in Google are of great importance. According to Lisa Konkvergud before you go, employees will be meeting the goal, and before you go away - agree, what tasks will be the following, and whom they instruct.

This method is even more than Google is important for a startup, where you need to organize the work in order to understand who will make the next step.

Another advantage of a small organization is that everyone takes part in various projects and can get acquainted with the work already done. Projects may overlap or set limits on what will have to work to this person. In order to avoid an excess of official duties or their lack, when a task or project is discussed, we clearly affirm who is responsible and for what part of the project.

Lisa Konkvergud