Googles Three Thirds

Googles Three Thirds One or Three Separate Teams

Excelsior College

Author Note

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Googles Three Thirds One or Three Separate Teams
According to Vice President of Global People Operations, Laszlo Bock Googles uses
what he calls the three-thirds staffing model. The first third of the teams employees are
qualified human resource managers. Some have additional fields such as employment law and
compensation and benefits. The second third is a group of analysts who hold doctorates in
statistics, finance, organizational psychology who study workforce demographics researching
compensation levels assist in interviewing hiring and retaining best talent for longer periods. .
The last third have little or no human resource experience and have backgrounds in engineering
or sales but are there because of their problem-solving skills and individual departmental
knowledge. (Kreitner & Kinicki 2013 p. 326)

Authentic Working Teams

Working with a team is extremely different then working alone, working within a group
successfully requires five things according to our text. 1. Leadership becomes a shared activity.
2. Accountability shifts from strictly individual to both individual and collective. 3. The group
develops its own purpose or mission. 4. Problem solving becomes a way of life, not a part-time
activity. 5. Effectiveness is measured by the groups collective outcomes and products. (Kreitner
& Kinicki 2013 p. 301) Effective teams need a formal leader, researchers state that the most
valuable trait required for people to work on teams is agreeableness. As stated by Highly
agreeable individuals have tendencies to be flexible, cooperative, compliant, and work well with
others, while less agreeable individuals tend to be argumentative and competitive. (Resick,
Dickson, Mitchelson, Allison, & Clark, 2010, p. 4) Too much agreeableness, youre in danger of
group thinking. Diversity is essential. You need to ensure that the information you have

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available for decision making the diversity of the ownership. (Oliver 2013 p. 1) Team members
need to work collectively yet keep their individuality, towards their objectives. This takes work
on the part of each member and managers, it requires significant practice and patience.
Teamwork Competencies
As human resource professionals, expected to work in a team environment, yes they should be
instructed on teamwork competencies. It is clear from the case analysis that each of Googles
thirds have their competencies, it does state in the case that the third with no human resource
background partner very well with traditional HR employees. (Kreitner & Kinicki 2013 p.
326) Within the team there needs to exist a level of trust, cooperation and willingness to work
together to achieve success. This Self-efficacy is the extent or strength of one's belief in one's
own ability to complete tasks and reach goals, this belief needs to extend to the entire team.
Trust. Building trust in your employees takes communication, support, respect, fairness,
predictability, competence. Employees need and want to know where they stand, where the
company stands, where the company is going. Managers need to approachable, able to give
support for their employees. As always, you have to give respect to receive it. Be fair, impartial
and consistent, employees appreciate a manager that is predictable. Make decisions based on as
much evidence and good business sense as you have available. If you take care of your
employees, they will in turn take care you. (Kreitner & Kinicki 2013 p. 314-315)
Group Type. Googles Three-Thirds has an instrumental cohesiveness. Each part of the
third has a vital goal that channels their special talents and each part of the third needs the other.
Since Google is such a tech oriented company I would make mandatory morning coffee and
donuts for face to face meetings. Assign mentors and/or liaisons from each of the thirds for
subgroups, conflicts etc. Team leadership should be held by someone who had an extensive

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background in at least two of the three thirds, they would be better able to handle any situation
that could arise.

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References
Kreitner, R., & Kinicki, A. (2013). Organizational behavior. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Oliver, C. (2013). Guarding against Groupthink. Board Leadership, 2013(129), 3.

Resick, C. J., Dickson, M. W., Mitchelson, J. K., Allison, L. K., & Clark, M. A. (2010). Team
Composition, Cognition, and Effectiveness: Examining Mental Model Similarity and
Accuracy. Group Dynamics-theory Research and Practice. doi:10.1037/a0018444