Offices

I was sent an email the other day about the business premises of Google (The parent company of this blog!)  It was truly amazing.  It had slides and fireman's poles to get down from one floor to another.  There were rooms to relax in, free food, and games like pool.  An incredible atmosphere to work in.  How unlike my first office experiences in London 50 years ago, where bosses seemed to enjoy keeping their serf-like employees in Victorian conditions.

At the time we would have given our eye teeth to work in the type of building on the left, but that is not the point.  The type of changes need to come from management, and not be abused by the employees.  Not such an easy matter.

Many years ago I was given MacGregor's book of management.  In it he expounded his X and Y theories.  Theory X was that people wanted to work and management's job was to help them do it in the best way for the company.  Theory Y was that people didn't want to work and management had to make them.

It's not hard to figure out how Google approached these theories, and they seem to have found some success!  As can be seen from this site http://1dak.com/people/google-office-pictures-47-pics/