What I did know was that Google’s culture struck me as the resurrection of my dream about creating an environment where people loved their work and one another, and that Sheryl struck me as a great boss. As a friend of mine later joked, “In Silicon Valley, you don’t fall down; you fall up.” (Rest assured, Bob has also landed on his feet.) — 7: 86-88
how things worked yet. Why did I behave this way? Partly because I believe there’s a special place in hell for those who “kick down and kiss up.” At least I wasn’t making that mistake. And yet my mistake was simply the other side of the same coin. I wasn’t really thinking of Larry as a human being. I saw him as a kind of demigod whom I could attack with impunity. Fundamental human decency is something every person owes every other, regardless of position. And it wasn’t as though Larry was shut down to criticism, as I had seen in his conversation with Matt Cutts. He’d given me no reason to be so strident. — 46: 685-689
JOBS: You need to do that in a way that does not call into question your confidence in their abilities but leaves not too much room for interpretation … and that’s a hard thing to do. [My italics.] — 59: 884-886
Finally, imagine you decide not to say anything because you’re thinking about your own feelings and reputation. You’re silent not because you’re concerned for Alex, but because you want to spare yourself. You care deeply about being liked, and you’re worried Alex won’t like you if you say something. You’re also worried if people overhear you saying something to Alex, they will judge you. So you walk on by and say nothing. If you’re really shameless, you might whisper to the next person who comes along to go check out Alex’s fly. Congratulations—your behavior is in the worst quadrant: Manipulative Insincerity! — 62: 930-934
For example, after asking a bunch of questions, I realized we weren’t doing any real account management (i.e., we weren’t working with our biggest customers to help them improve in ways that would make them, and Google, more money.) When I asked why, the answer was “That wouldn’t be Googley! We treat all our customers exactly the same, no matter how big or small they are.” My suggestion that we prioritize was met with looks that made it clear my very morality was suspect. — 100: 1526-1529
From then on, my colleague argued longer and more loudly, and he kept arguing until either he convinced Steve he was right or Steve convinced him he was wrong. — 105: 1596-1597
That is why kick-ass bosses often do not decide themselves, but rather create a clear decision-making process that empowers people closest to the facts to make as many decisions as possible. Not only does that result in better decisions, it results in better morale. The decider should get facts, not recommendations When collecting information for a decision, we are often tempted to ask people for their recommendations—“What do you think we should do?”—but as one executive I worked with at Apple explained to me, people tend to put their egos into recommendations in a way that can lead to politics, and thus worse decisions. So she recommended seeking “facts, not recommendations.” Of course “facts” come inflected with each person’s particular perspective or point of view, but they are less likely to become a line in the sand than a recommendation is. — 128: 1956-1963
To help you be more persuasive, and to teach the “deciders” on your team to be more persuasive, the rest of this section will cover, briefly, Aristotle’s elements of rhetoric—pathos, logos, and ethos, which I’ll translate loosely as emotion, logic, and credibility. — 131: 2004-2006
Credibility is one of those things that is hard to articulate — 133: 2035-2035
JOHNSON & JOHNSON’S ORIGINAL credo had an interesting line: “Employees should have an organized system for suggestions and complaints.” When it got rewritten, this intention got watered down into a much vaguer and less useful statement: “Employees must feel free to make suggestions and complaints.” If you’re the boss, you have to do much better than announce how employees “must” feel. Employees won’t feel free if you don’t take specific actions to ensure that it’s not just safe but expected to make suggestions and complaints. You have to organize a system. But it needn’t be elaborate. — 166: 2551-2556
The idea is that when you are mindful that your subjective experience is not objective truth, it can help you challenge others in a way that invites a reciprocal challenge. — 171: 2622-2623
Situation, behavior, and impact applies to praise as well as to criticism. — 169: 2604-2605
Keep slack time in your calendar, or be willing to be late. Prioritizing something generally means making time in your calendar for it. But how do you make time in your calendar for something that is “impromptu”? You can’t. Better to talk to the person right away. But in order for that to happen, you must do one of two things. One, keep slack time in your calendar, either by not scheduling back-to-back meetings or by having twenty-five- and fifty-minute meetings with hard stops, not thirty- and sixty-minute meetings. Or, simply be willing to be late to your next meeting. — 174: 2683-2687
If you are in a remote office, or if you are managing people in remote offices, it’s really important to have quick, frequent interactions. This will allow you to pick up on people’s most subtle emotional cues. I learned this from Maurice Tempelsman, my boss when I lived in Russia. He made a point of calling me every day from New York, if only for a three-minute check-in call. He had operations in Africa in the 1970s and had learned the importance of frequent communication to pick up on emotional cues from people in far-flung locations. — 178: 2734-2738
Making a fundamental attribution error is using perceived personality attributes—“You’re stupid, lazy, greedy, hypocritical, an asshole,” etc.—to explain someone else’s behavior rather than considering one’s own behavior and/or the situational factors that were probably the real cause of the other person’s behavior. It’s a problem because 1) it’s generally inaccurate and 2) it renders an otherwise solvable problem really hard to fix since changing core personality attributes is so very difficult and time-consuming. — 180: 2768-2771
The phrase “don’t take it personally” is worse than useless. — 181: 2788-2789
In my experience, most bosses fear being jerks but employees fear their bosses are not shooting straight. — 184: 2828-2829
your job as the boss is to help them think about how they can acquire those skills: what are the projects you can put them on, whom can you introduce them to, what are the options for education? — 221: 3403-3405
“What do you want the pinnacle of your career to look like?” — 220: 3398-3398