JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA

DELHI

ORGANIZATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

Structure at Google LLC

Rimsha Khan
B.A. (Hons) Economics
Semester- IV
Organization Structure
An organizational structure defines how activities such as task allocation, coordination
and supervision are directed toward the achievement of organizational aims. Organizations
need to be efficient, flexible, innovative and caring in order to achieve a sustainable
competitive advantage. Organizational structure can also be considered as the viewing glass
or perspective through which individuals see their organization and its environment.
Organizations are a variant of clustered entities.
An organization can be structured in many different ways, depending on its objectives. The
structure of an organization will determine the modes in which it operates and performs.
Organizational structure allows the expressed allocation of responsibilities for different
functions and processes to different entities such as the branch, department, workgroup,
and individual.
Organizational structure affects organizational action in two ways:
It provides the foundation on which standard operating procedures and routines rest.
It determines which individuals get to participate in which decision-making processes, and
thus to what extent their views shape the organization’s actions.

Google LLC
Google LLC is an American multinational technology company that specializes in Internet-
related services and products, which include online advertising technologies, search
engine, cloud computing, software, and hardware. It is considered one of the Big
Four technology companies, alongside Amazon, Apple and Facebook.
Google was founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students
at Stanford University in California. Together they own about 14 percent of its shares and
control 56 percent of the stockholder voting power through supervoting stock. They
incorporated Google as a privately held company on September 4, 1998. An initial public
offering (IPO) took place on August 19, 2004, and Google moved to its headquarters in
Mountain View, California, nicknamed the Googleplex. In August 2015, Google announced
plans to reorganize its various interests as a conglomerate called Alphabet Inc. Google is
Alphabet's leading subsidiary and will continue to be the umbrella company for Alphabet's
Internet interests. Sundar Pichai was appointed CEO of Google, replacing Larry Page who
became the CEO of Alphabet.
The company's rapid growth since incorporation has triggered a chain of products,
acquisitions, and partnerships beyond Google's core search engine (Google Search). It offers
services designed for work and productivity (Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google
Slides), email (Gmail/Inbox), scheduling and time management (Google Calendar), cloud
storage (Google Drive), instant messaging and video chat (Google Allo, Duo, Hangouts),
 language translation (Google Translate), mapping and navigation (Google
Maps, Waze, Google Earth, Street View), video sharing (YouTube), note-taking (Google
Keep), and photo organizing and editing (Google Photos). The company leads the
development of the Android mobile operating system, the Google Chrome web browser,
and Chrome OS, a lightweight operating system based on the Chrome browser. Google has
moved increasingly into hardware; from 2010 to 2015, it partnered with major electronics
manufacturers in the production of its Nexus devices, and it released multiple hardware
products in October 2016, including the Google Pixel smartphone, Google Home smart
speaker, Google Wi-Fi mesh wireless router, and Google Daydream virtual reality headset.
Google has also experimented with becoming an Internet carrier (Google Fiber, Project Fi,
and Google Station).
Google LLC’s success is linked to the effectiveness of its organizational structure and
organizational culture in supporting excellence in innovation. In theory, a company’s
organizational or corporate structure is the arrangement of components and resources based
on the overall design of the organization. In contrast, a company’s organizational or corporate
culture is the set of beliefs, values, behavioral tendencies, and expectations among
employees. Google’s organizational structure is not conventional because of its emphasis on
flatness. In relation, the company’s organizational culture is also not typical because it
emphasizes change and direct social links within the firm. Theory suggests that a strong
alignment between a firm’s corporate structure and corporate culture can lead to higher
chances of success. This benefit is manifested in the case of Google’s information technology
and Internet services business, which continues to expand in the global industry. The
company’s dominant position is attributable to the synergistic benefits of its organizational
structure and organizational culture.

Analysis of Google’s Organization Structure

Google has a cross-functional organizational structure, which is technically a matrix
corporate structure with a considerable degree of flatness. This flatness is a defining
structural feature that supports the company’s growth and competitiveness. The main
characteristics of Google’s organizational structure are as follows:

 Function-based departmentalization
 Product-based departmentalization
 Flatness

Function-Based - This structural characteristic refers to grouping of resources and processes

based on business function. For example, Google’s organizational structure involves a group
for Global Marketing, and another group for Finance. An executive heads each of these
groups. This function-based grouping is responsible for organization-wide strategic decisions
and direction. For instance, Google’s operations management approaches are developed and
defined through these function-based groups at the corporate headquarters. This characteristic
of the company’s corporate structure influences business processes, such as top-down and
bottom-up communications, as well as strategic management to solve problems encountered
at various levels and areas of Google’s organization.

Product-Based - Google’s products are developed through the support of product-based

groups in the company’s corporate structure. This structural feature addresses the need to
develop innovative and competitive products, such as the ones enumerated in Google’s
marketing mix or 4Ps. For example, the company has a group for Cloud operations, and
another group for Artificial Intelligence operations. An executive heads each of these groups.
Through this characteristic of the organizational structure, the business satisfies current and
future market demand and consumer preferences regarding information technology and
consumer electronics products, such as Search, mobile apps, and mobile devices. This ability
helps fulfill Google’s corporate vision and mission statements. The company’s product lines
are aimed at enhancing people’s access to organized information, especially information
through the online environment. A flat organizational structure means that Google’s
employees, teams or groups can bypass middle management and communicate directly with
higher management. Based on the flatness of the corporate structure, employees can meet and
share information across teams.

Flatness - This structural characteristic involves the minimization of vertical hierarchical

lines of communication and authority, despite Google’s function-based groups. For example,
through its flatness, the company’s organizational structure enables employees, teams, and
groups to bypass middle management and communicate directly with upper management.
Also, in this way, Google’s corporate structure facilitates meetings and sharing of
information among employees and teams belonging to different areas of the organization.
This structural feature is a major contributor to innovation for novel products that help in
business diversification, which is among the business strengths outlined in the SWOT
analysis of Google LLC. This characteristic of the organizational structure supports Google’s
corporate social responsibility strategy and stakeholder management, especially in terms of
increasing employee morale, motivation, and satisfaction in their work as part of the
company’s business and long-term success.

Task Specialization
Task Specialization, also known as division of labor, refers to the degree to which tasks
necessary to achieve organizational objectives is divided into various jobs. Task
specialization allows managers to break complex tasks into smaller, more precise tasks that
individual employees can complete. Each worker is trained on how best to perform a specific
task. Over time, that worker becomes proficient and effective at performing that task.
In Google, work is divided into Teams. There are many Teams in Google from Engineering
and Design to Sales Operations. The initial deals with the development of Technology while
the second sets the business direction and ensures it run smoothly.
 Centralization/Decentralization
Google's corporate structure is not particularly unusual other than the existence of a few
unique leadership positions such as Chief Culture Officer and Chief Internet Evangelist. The
company is overseen by a board of directors, which passes instructions down through an
executive management group. This group oversees several departments such as Engineering,
Products, Legal, Finance and Sales. Each of these departments is divided into smaller units.
For instance, the Sales department has branches dedicated to the Americas, Asia Pacific, and
Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Despite the use of a standard corporate organizational
structure, Google has developed a corporate culture based on giving employees substantial
leeway to develop new ideas without excessive oversight.

The 70/20/10 Rule

All Google employees follow a rule called the 70/20/10 rule, under which they are expected
to devote 70 percent of every work day to whichever projects are assigned by management,
20 percent of each day to new projects or ideas related to their core projects, and 10 percent
to any new ideas they want to pursue regardless of what they might be. The company credits
this rule with being the driving force behind many of Google's new products and services,
because programmers, salespeople and even executives are given enough space to be
creative.
When the company became too large to easily manage the flow of new ideas and projects, it
instituted a schedule of meetings between employees and the company's founders and chief
executives. At these meetings, employees can pitch new ideas and projects directly to the top
executives.

Conclusion
Google’s organizational culture is not typical, partly because of the effects of the company’s
organizational structure. In essence, the structure and the culture interact to influence the
capabilities and cultural characteristics of the organization. Google’s corporate culture has the
following primary characteristics:

1. Open
2. Innovative
3. Smart with emphasis on excellence
4. Hands-on
5. Supports small-company-family rapport

Openness involves sharing of information to improve Google’s business processes. Openness

is achieved through the matrix organizational structure. Within the context of Google’s
organizational culture, employees feel free to give their ideas and opinions, such as in
 meetings with managers. Also, innovation is at the heart of Google LLC. Every employee is
encouraged to contribute innovative ideas. In addition, this corporate culture pushes for
smartness among Google’s employees. The aim is to motivate workers to strive for
excellence. Moreover, the company supports employee involvement in projects and
experiments, which are implemented to test new ideas. Google’s organizational culture
creates a social ambiance that is warm. Warmth is a factor that facilitates information sharing
and employee satisfaction. The company’s organizational culture maintains a small-
company-family ambiance, where people can easily share ideas with each other, including
executives like Larry Page. Thus, Google’s corporate culture supports excellence in
innovation through the sharing of ideas and the capability to rapidly respond to the global
market for information technology, cloud computing and Internet services, and consumer
electronics.

REFERENCES
 Alphabet Inc. – Form 10-K.
 Alvesson, M. (2012). Understanding Organizational Culture. Sage.
 Ashkenas, R., Ulrich, D., Jick, T., & Kerr, S. (2015). The boundaryless organization:
Breaking the chains of organizational structure. John Wiley & Sons.
 Borodai, V. (2017). Brand of the employer as DNA of corporate culture of service
company. European Research, 2(1), 34-35.
 Claver-Cortes, E., Pertusa-Ortega, E. M., & Molina-Azorin, J. F. (2012). Characteristics of
organizational structure relating to hybrid competitive strategy. Journal of Business
Research, 65(7), 993-1002.
 Elsbach, K. D., & Stigliani, I. (2018). Design Thinking and Organizational Culture: A
Review and Framework for Future Research. Journal of Management, 44(6), 2274-2306.
 Fiordelisi, F., & Ricci, O. (2014). Corporate culture and CEO turnover. Journal of Corporate
Finance, 28, 66-82.
 Google LLC – Careers – Teams.
 Google LLC – Our Products.
 Guiso, L., Sapienza, P., & Zingales, L. (2015). Corporate culture, societal culture, and
institutions. American Economic Review, 105(5), 336-39.
 Guiso, L., Sapienza, P., & Zingales, L. (2015). The value of corporate culture. Journal of
Financial Economics, 117(1), 60-76.