In late April, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), the British HR professional body, held its yearly HRD Conference and Exhibition in London. HRD 2013 was focused on coaching, talent management and individual approaches to employee development and education. One of the most interesting speeches on this topic was presented by Stephan Thoma, Learning and Development Director at Google. The following methods of Google employee development from his lecture were published on the People Management website.
1. Everybody has a talent
Google approaches each employee with the assumption that he/she has talent to be further developed in the company. If they had no talent, they would not have been hired and the L&D department would not waste time on them.
2. No strict structure is needed
Google follows the motto of its HR vice-president Laszlo Bock: "Give people freedom and they will amaze you." The company seeks to promote a natural approach to education from both top-down and bottom-up.
3. Learning is called G2G
Google relies on its internal training program called Googler to Googler (G2G). Employees are mutually learning and teaching what they personally do best. Training programs are in written form, or via videos on the internal YouTube channel. One of the most popular courses is called "Medieval survival skills."
4. Learning is based on using the company's products
Google employees are always the first to try new products, they are currently using the Google glasses. When testing products, new ideas arise not only on product improvement, but also on future development on both the individual and team levels.
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