
Google’s Management Doesn’t Use Google+ - thisisblurry
http://theunderstatement.com/post/11018308302/googles-management-doesnt-use-google
======
Kylekramer
This thought: _Further, I think it’s reasonable to assume a correlation
between private use & public use_ kills the whole article. No, it isn't a
reasonable assumption. If you look at my Facebook without being a friend of
mine, you get a picture of me. Five years of use and that is the only public
thing I have published. And I am just another dude no one cares about. I am
sure billionaire CEOs and board members who have actual reporters, normal
everyday gossiphounds and even crazies caring about their personal lives have
even more incentive to be private. Google+'s promise isn't that is a
combination of Facebook and Twitter, it is a social network where it does what
you want it to. And if Google management wants their sharing to be private,
that is good. I suspect a large number of their users have a similar outlook.

~~~
vaughan
I disagree - he makes a reasonable assumption. G+ allows you to share things
that are public and share things that are private.

If someone was sharing things that are private (our assumption), wouldn't it
follow that they are sharing things that they have indicated (via some other
means) are public?

For example, David Drummond's post on the Google Blog regarding Android
patents ([http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-patents-
attack-a...](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-patents-attack-
android.html)). He has authored this post, indicated this is public but failed
to share it publicly using G+. Is this not the purpose of G+?

These execs attend press events often where they openly voice their opinion in
the public domain. It's a public company too and these people are actually
accountable to the public.

However, it seems that although they share publicly when asked to by reporters
and their open-ended questions they do not see G+ as a means to publicly
share. They do not understand the value of information sharing and user
generated content, the cornerstone of web 2.0. They are still stuck in a pull-
based world driven by journalists asking questions. Facebook and Twitter
understood the value of this change well by living through it
(<http://vaughan.io/post/10476571077/live-the-problem>).

What we can draw from this is that its not going to be Google who jumps on the
next big trend in social, if they can't even understand how to use their
current product to its intended effect. They only built G+ because the concept
was proven by Facebook and now they are just replicating it. Facebook will
continue to lead the market here until the top executives like Larry, Sergey,
Alan Eustace, etc. can understand their own product, its weaknesses and its
strengths.

~~~
cbs
_He has authored this post, indicated this is public but failed to share it
publicly using G+. Is this not the purpose of G+?_

I write blog posts _for my employer, on the employer's blog_ frequently. I
never share them on my private accounts on social networks. Why should I?
Thats not "cbs, person" thats "cbs, talking on behalf of Corp X". Even if I
was in senior management I wouldn't want to dilute myself as a person by
posting things on social networks that are not me.

You're basically arguing that google execs don't understand G+ because, they
haven't mixed their personal and professional lives to a sufficient extent.
That is a rather bold conclusion to draw. Maybe they're just private people.

It is impossible for me to use the product I work on day-to-day. It would
literally kill me if I tried. Does that mean I'm unable to understand it?

------
hosh
This article is flawed. It is making an assumption that public posts
correlates with private posts.

"Further, I think it’s reasonable to assume a correlation between private use
& public use: if you were constantly posting things on a service and each time
you were given the option to make it public or private, surely sometimes you’d
make it public, especially as a somewhat public figure wanting to help your
own company’s new service get going."

This is fallacy, and it is not even persuasive fallacy.

I make significantly more private posts than I do public posts. I've made
exactly two public posts since using it in the early field testing days, and
have many more private posts. The friends in my circle tends to share
privately, not publicly. You don't have to make public posts to use Google+.

We can say for certain that Google management do not make _public_ posts. We
cannot say for certain that Google management do not use Google+ at all.

~~~
degusta
(I'm the author). Your last point is very true, and the chart tries to make it
very clear it's only talking about public posts. Obviously entirely true that
they could be using it purely privately, but I still think is an observation
worth making that they're not using it publicly.

As far the correlation in general, as I mention in the thread above, these
aren't normal people, they're the leaders/overseers of the company using (or
not) a landmark initiative whose leader (Vic Gundotra) clearly thinks that
ideally it'd be used for both private and public interactions. At the very
least, it'd look a lot better if they had accounts, tried making a public post
(even just to congratulate the team publicly), and looked a bit more publicly
engaged.

~~~
hosh
@degusta Whether these leaders publicly eat their own dogfood or not is a
matter of rhetorics and strategy. If that were your thesis and narrative, we
would be having a much more interesting conversation.

However, you didn't entitle your article, "Google Management Doesn't Care
About Google+" You said, "Google Management Doesn't Use Google+". The former
expresses your perception of Google strategy backed by the data you've
collected. The latter is merely link bait.

I do congratulate you. The link bait worked.

~~~
degusta
Actually, I agree that might have been a better title - would have avoided
some of the controversy while making the same point. (And, fwiw, I don't have
any ads or make any money off my blog, nor did I really think the post would
catch on to this extent.)

------
Lewisham
Remember that Larry re-org'd Google into product groups, and the SVP of Social
is Vic Gundorota. My understanding is that these groups are supposed to work
in a more autonomous fashion, with Larry more of a Jobsian gatekeeper and
guiding hand.

If you are to make some sort of conclusion based on whether the boss is using
it or not, you need to _actually choose the boss._ Vic is the boss of Google+,
and he's made 150+ posts. Seems pretty good to me.

~~~
barista
I think the point is that even senior googlers don't think its valuable/useful
enough.

~~~
kd0amg
Useful to them specifically or useful in general?

Dogfooding is nice and all, but some people are not part of their products'
target audiences.

------
larsberg
Maybe they all have their accounts in Google Apps and G+ is just not available
to them yet :-)

------
lojack
> Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg really does use Facebook all day. Twitter CEO
> Dick Costolo tweeted at least 30 times just yesterday.

And, likewise, I'm sure Google's management uses Google Search on a regular
basis.

~~~
barista
But not Google+... and thats exactly the point.

~~~
AaronI
A point which is based on a flawed assumption. Public posts don't necessarily
correlate with private posts.

------
nr0mx
The correct title should have been: "Google's Management Doesn't Use Google+
For Public Posts". But not so good for pageviews, is it?

"Management caring deeply about their company’s products and using them every
day is almost always a prerequisite of making great products."

From my time on Google+, the Google+ team seems to be highly visible and doing
a terrific job interacting on the site. It seems like a useful update is
announced by the team - not management - almost weekly.

"Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg really does use Facebook all day."

Of course, quite obvious from the sheer volume of daily public posts
Zuckerberg makes on Facebook.

It seems pointless to continue to dissect this post any further.

~~~
emil0r
There just is no pleasing everyone is there. Next there will be angry calls to
+God for not posting public.

------
gojomo
I'd bet Google management doesn't click on Google ads very often, either.

~~~
rbanffy
If they did, Google should be banned from AdSense according to its own policy.

------
gamble
Nothing embarrasing here. I'm sure it's just that Google's management are very
private people who wouldn't like their personal information exposed and spread
about to third parties.

------
tlogan
This is really a big news because apparently 25 percent of employee bonuses
are tied to the success of Google+.

The news is that Larry didn't convince his management team and the board that
G+ is very important for the future of Google.

------
j_baker
I'm not sure this is fair. Google is a large company with a lot of products.
You simply can't expect top management to be an active user of _all_ of them.
I'm sure Apple doesn't require its top execs to own an iPhone, iPod, iPod
nano, iPod touch, iMac, MacBook Air.... you get the idea. The comparison with
Twitter is even worse. Twitter really only has one product.

The way this data is organized, I don't see any top executives not using
Google+ that "should" be using it.

~~~
gallamine
However, the author of the article mentioned that Google is saying Google+ is
THE future of the company. In that case, everyone should be using it. It's not
"just another" product.

~~~
j_baker
_However, the author of the article mentioned that Google is saying Google+ is
THE future of the company._

Just because the author mentioned that doesn't make it true.

[http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/06/googles...](http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/06/googles_ex-
ceo_admits_underest.html)

The author cites this article, which (ignoring the fact that it is an
interview with Google _ex_ -CEO) doesn't even mention Google Plus by name.
Personally, I'd say that the author's post demonstrates that Google _doesn't_
think Google Plus is central to the company's future.

~~~
DaveMebs
Yeah, 'cause it's not like the current CEO has tied every employee's bonus to
Google's success in social, regardless of whether or not they work on the
product...

Oh, wait.

[http://www.businessinsider.com/larry-page-just-tied-
employee...](http://www.businessinsider.com/larry-page-just-tied-employee-
bonuses-to-the-success-of-the-googles-social-strategy-2011-4)

------
Tichy
Maybe they have actual work to do and can not procrastinate on Twitter or G+
like the rest of us.

------
darksaga
Google+ was supposed to compete with Facebook and having people's salaries
tied to something this big, you would expect EVERYBODY to be on board.

I'd be pretty pissed if my salary was tied up in this and articles like this
come out basically saying, "Your own execs don't think this is a good enough
product to use themselves."

Regardless of how private they want to be, they should be using the product or
at the very least have some assistant or intern posting for them. I'm pretty
certain most celebs and top tech execs don't do all of their updates. You
don't have to post private stuff, just make an effort to show you're using the
product.

------
decklin
What an utterly awful use of a pie chart.

~~~
squidsoup
According to Edward Tufte, there's no such thing as a good use of a pie chart.

------
philipmorg
I suppose if Google+ was a conventional product--and one could get accurate
information about whether or not Google's execs actually used it--this article
might have a point.

But Google+ isn't a product. It's more like an API that uses a graphic user
interface to transfer personal data from users to Google. Google then uses
that data to provide an actual product to its actual customers: advertisers.

<http://investor.google.com/corporate/faq.html>

------
jonmc12
"Management caring deeply about their company’s products and using them every
day is almost always a prerequisite of making great products"

..when management is also happens to be in the target market of the product.
Quite a broad and incorrect generalization to kick off an analysis like this.

~~~
degusta
I'm the author and you're right. I hadn't thought of that, I was just thinking
in the narrow space of consumer-y services/devices that have a broad target
market. Something like "and being intimately familiar with them" would have
been much better.

------
ethank
Probably for the same reason I stopped: it's not fun.

Given I have a finite amount of time to socialize my identity online, the
value proposition of a service has to extend into emotion rather than pure
pragmatism.

Fun and joy: maximize this for me and my loyalty follows. If you want me to
switch, you had best maximize these more than the existing player.

In Googles case, the service just isn't fun. I always feel like I am missing
things, it's hard to track comments you have read and the circle interface is
klunky. Facebook has the same type of issues as an information service, but
makes up for it in being a fun service for identity curation. Twitter is the
best for a river-of-discourse type use case.

------
dasil003
Yes there might be a good correlation between dogfooding in senior management
and great products, but it's not worth shoving a square peg into a round hole
to meet this superficial criteria.

The reason Facebook and Twitter executives use their respective services is
because that is the core product from the very beginning. Google+ on the other
hand is a tertiary product. Just because management realizes they need a
foothold in social doesn't mean that they should forcibly try to transmute
themselves into the target market. Instead they should have people in charge
of the product that care enough to use it naturally, and I think that's what
they're doing.

~~~
vaughan
I would say Google+ is a core product for Google now. The OP submits this
article to back this claim up:
[http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/06/googles...](http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/06/googles_ex-
ceo_admits_underest.html)

Eric Schmidt admits he "screwed up" by not seeing the importance of social and
the threat of Facebook. If Eric Schmidt really lived the problem
(<http://vaughan.io/post/10476571077/live-the-problem>) he would have been
actively using Facebook and Twitter too and would have reacted faster.

------
vaughan
Google+ has made a point to enforce a real names policy - no pseudonyms
allowed. Surely high level executives have things they would like to say
publicly or comment on posts which they see. Reading articles is one thing,
but taking the time to form a cohesive argument or opinion required to make
comment on public articles can greatly enhance comprehension of a topic.
Responding to criticism is also a part of this.

Are we to believe that people rise the ranks to a position of power where they
suddenly need not debate issues in the public sphere and take the criticism
that goes along with it?

Surely not. So wouldn't it then make sense to at least allow pseudonyms?

------
crag
There aren't exactly doing much for their brand are they? It's not about what
they do privately.. I mean, hire some PR lackey to post "public" recipes or
list your favoriate bands - whatever.

It's perceptions that matter.

------
natasham25
This is an opportunity for the Google leadership to be leaders not only in
their company but outside of it by contributing their knowledge and lessons
learned to the public. Unfortunately, they are not taking this leadership
opportunity, since most of the posts from Larry Page and Sergey Brin are from
their amazing adventures and travels, which shows that they themselves don't
understand the real power of social media and how they can use it to actually
contribute to the world.

~~~
degusta
(I'm the author) That's a really good observation re the content of the
founders' posts, especially Mr. Brin's.

------
guyzero
I'm really hoping David Drummond will use G+ to tell us all about the lawsuits
his staff is in the process of deposing. That's sure to happen.

~~~
vaughan
David Drummond has blogged publicly on the Google Blog
([http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-patents-
attack-a...](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-patents-attack-
android.html)) a few times. Surely it would make sense for him to publish this
on his public G+ feed.

------
badclient
So will people believe me now that google+ is dead?

------
Dolph
Eric Schmidt was actually registered at Google+, but removed his account
within the first week when it was "launched" back in jun/july

------
dendory
I like Google Plus, I post many things every day. But I'm among those worried
about its future. Out of over 700 people I follow, only around 30 post daily,
most posted at one point (I don't follow people who never posted) but don't
anymore. I think people have a use for Twitter, Facebook, but G+ is inbetween
and doesn't have enough of an obvious use yet.

------
Flenser
In the same way google has their own internal version of gmail with features
that aren't publicly they will have in internal version of G+. I expect they
all use that internal G+ even if they don't use the public one.

------
joshu
One of the problems with being somewhat famous and being on these things is
that you get barraged with stuff from random people.

I was mentioned in an early Googler's post and I still get barraged with
stuff.

~~~
vaughan
This is even more of a reason that Google execs should use Google+ publicly.
They would then understand this problem exists for this type of user and push
for solutions. Perhaps some sort of priority inbox feature for Google+?

Zuckerberg would have come across this problem and would have prioritized it.
Features like the Social Inbox and the constant revisions of the feed might be
examples of this.

~~~
joshu
Good point. That said, the main folks (Vic, Bradley) in charge do in fact use
it.

------
alexwolfe
Not to worry, I got plenty of free invites. I'll send them a few.

------
epc
Neither Facebook nor Twitter are public companies. Is it possible that Google
execs are in a quiet period due to the Motorola Mobility deal?

------
snorkel
The author is right. Those senior managers need to ask themselves why they
used a competing service instead of their own.

------
gjenkin
The article failed to mention SVP of Commerce and Local: Jeff Huber. He's
posted about 40 times. Seems pretty active.

------
vaughan
Strange...Alan Eustace has made 3 public posts on October 5, 2011. Perhaps
he's a HN reader.

~~~
degusta
Indeed. And Susan Wojcicki has also come to life (after only making one public
post ever back in August). :)

------
ditojim
i'd be willing to bet google execs use hangouts quite a bit, which is
technically google+..

------
speleding
Perhaps Google uses Google Apps internally, Google+ is not yet available on
Apps

------
kragen
Larry and Sergey are probably just posting under pen names. ;)

~~~
vaughan
Google+ explicitly doesn't allow the use of pseudonyms.

~~~
Luyt
That rule is for 'ordinary' people/users. Certain 'special' people are
exempted from this, and are allowed fictitious names.

~~~
kragen
Are you sure? How do you know?

~~~
brlewis
Put this in your favorite search engine: thomas hawk pseudonym

------
spullara
This is perfectly normal. Carol Bartz (and most of the executive team) didn't
use Yahoo's products either...

------
gojomo
Why, next you'll tell me Zynga execs don't play Farmville, and TV execs don't
watch reality shows!

~~~
degusta
(I'm the author) Actually, I would tend to think that TV execs do watch their
reality TV programs & even suspect Zynga execs have at least played a bit of
Farmville, and certainly should if it's their company's biggest initiative of
the year. But I do think the eat-your-own-dogfood applies more in some
businesses than others, as jonmc12 pointed out below. Though Google+ is one
where it certainly could apply - not exactly steel beams or something.

------
shareme
The author is wrong..there is a Google+ sandbox and I am told that Google
management is in fact using Google+ through that from Google insiders..

~~~
djacobs
The internal Google+ network is huge and bustling. My Google friends who use
it say that comparatively, the public version is very dead.

------
wavephorm
Apparently they took one look at how Google would be using their information
and said "fuck that".

------
RyanKearney
Kind of hard to use Google+ when Google Apps doesn't even support it!

/sarcasm

