Work Force Planning - Google - Report Example

Human resource management Nam: Course: Tutor: Date: Work Force Planning Google started as just as an ordinary search engine in 1996, in an attempt to organize the information on the world wide web into a form that one can easily find whatever he or she is looking for amidst millions, and now billions, of pages that are available on the Internet (Hardy, 2005, 26). Faced with the problem of not well performing search engines, two PhD students Sergey and Larry set out to form a search engine, and named it Google. This gave birth two the biggest search engines used in the world today, growing to be in the list of the world top ten brands. Today, Google specializes not only in search engine, but also in a wide range of services that include video sharing, blogging, email services, cloud-computing services, information hub, and advertising services. The company’s primary market is in the web content arena, but this has been diversified to provide a wide number of services, not only in the United States, but also in a global context. Google has a sizeable number of staff under its command, most of them being developers and engineers. It has clearly established itself as the market leader as far as online marketing is concerned, and has managed to stay as the leader in the field marked with a lot of competition and a battle for supremacy. This has been possible due to Google’s innovativeness, releasing one piece of innovative technology after the other. Google has also established offices in different countries and regional blocks to administer different geographical regions. As a multinational corporation with a global vision to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful, Google’s success is powered by its more than twenty four thousand staff located in different parts of the world. The company place considerable value on its employees, who are ranked as the most productive employees in such industry, when compared to any of its many rivals (Girard, 2009, 76). In addition, Google has several times been voted to be the best place to work in the United States and probably in the world, owing to its substantial investment in human resource development. The company has twenty four thousand employees, a figure that keeps increasing by four thousand employees every year. Currently, Google receives some three thousand applications every day, a clear indicator of the healthy work environment. A great number of Google’s employees include the developers and engineers. These are tasked with the responsibility of driving innovations and inventions; the concept that Google currently rides on. In order to encourage productivity, the company has a basic organizational structure that focuses mostly on the use of self-managed teams. This makes the operation of the teams remarkably efficient and minimizes the need for a lot of supervision. The teams work with self-supervision, whereby everyone in the team plays the role of a team member and is under the scrutiny of the other peers. This kind of structure has enhanced performance and propelled Google into its current position. Performance is enhanced in various ways at the corporation. Google has opted not to use the conventional methods that are applied in order to force productivity and squeeze out every bit of the employee’s energy. Instead, it has gone forward to make the workplace the most comfortable environment ever, which ensures that employees spend their time trying to be more productive, since what they could need to use outside their official work has been given to them. In addition, Google gives its engineers some free time to work on projects of their choice, and result in this has been some remarkably innovative products like Gmail, blogger and orkut (Hardy, 2005, 51). Recruiting staff is not an easy part for Google, a company that seeks for the best among millions of applicants. The search for the best talent means that the company recruits from all over the world, also because they have regional offices in various parts of the world. The process of recruiting and retaining keeps on getting more difficult for Google, as expectations are raised and things keep on changing. Already, Google has already lost some of its crucial employees to other related firms like Facebook. One of the main reasons for this is because Google hires the best, a disadvantage in the sense that these top-in-their’s-fields are extremely competitive and can easily be poached by rival firms. Political changes also pose a problem to Google, being a multinational company. There have been places where governments have been hostile to Google, like China, whereas in other countries, it is extremely difficult to take expatriates to work there, forcing Google to hire the locals out of desperation. In the future, such limiting policies mean that Google will have to reconsider its effort of establishing regional offices in terms of staffing. Technological advancement will affect the corporation in two different ways. First, better Internet connectivity will allow the different engineers and developers to work from far off locations, and still achieve almost the same effectiveness as if they were in the same geographical location. This will remove geographical limitation, allowing Google to hire developers from any corner of the world, without requiring them to work from California. The other effect is in terms of outsourcing, whereby, it will be easier for the corporation to outsource for the nonessential staff, like customer care and the sales team (Mc Bain, 2001, 26). Social factors will also play a key role. Currently, one of the things that promote productivity at the corporation is the close network of friendship that the workers share and enjoy. This creates a team environment, whereby team building activities are been exhaustively done to promote the welfare of the group. It would not be conclusive to say that the success of the company depends on the high level of socialization that is there, but it is obvious that it plays a vital role. This will pose a challenge when hiring local staff in different countries, as the company expands to countries where it has little or no presence now. Competition among the various firms that are in the same line of business with Google will determine various things. Poaching for employees will mean that a company must work harder to retain them. In addition, many of these employees are pursuing a personal challenge and if Google fails to offer that, they will be bound to move. The company therefore must maintain or improve the same pace of growth and innovativeness. Additionally, Google has posted profits to the tune of twelve billion US dollars in the year 2010. This enormous profit is a key factor in enhancing job satisfaction also maintaining massive remuneration levels. If the profits adversely drop, it will be obvious that Google will have to reduce these posh expenses. This would result in price cut or even less payment. This would lead to many employees leaving for better opportunities with other companies (Benard, 2009, 12). Google is known for hiring youngsters and young people who are remarkably innovative and are burning with passion to come up with something new. In addition, the company also ensures that it hires highly experienced and well learned experts, who act as a benchmark to ensure that any idea that is brought forward for trial by these young and innovative engineers is workable and it stands a chance. This acts as a control measure for effective functioning of the company. What remains contentious is whether the trend will continue, as their employees grow old and there is a need to retain them. The company may have to revise its hiring policies as time goes on (Southland, 1999, 16). When the company started, it was just a search engine. However, Google has grown to incorporate other services into their portfolio, leading to diversification and expansion into new markets. This has been necessitated by the dynamics that are exhibited by the industry. The corporation today has other famous services like Gmail, blogger, YouTube, orkut and adsense. To remain relevant, there will be a need to introduce some new products and since technology can be highly unpredictable sometimes, one can predict with certainty what will be the mover in the next five years. The change that technology takes will therefore dictate what Google needs, what should be there effort and can lead to their failure. This will have an effect on who to employ and who not to. Concerning planning about the workforce, Google will need to put into consideration these factors. Planning for future staffing need will require that the company look at the various options that they have, including an option to outsource instead of hiring. While Google seeks the best of all, it will need to brace itself for tough times as the other teams will be seeking to take over or challenge what Google has achieved. This will help to accurately come up with an elaborate recruiting and retaining mechanisms (Frazier, 2010, 49). Bibliography Delen, D and S. Al-Hawamdeh,2009. 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