

Apple fires up its version of Google’s "20% time" - sumukh1
http://thenextweb.com/apple/2012/11/12/apple-fires-up-its-version-of-googles-20-time-giving-some-employees-2-weeks-for-special-projects

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alwaysinshade
I’m glad Tim Cook is trying new things like this, involving Jony Ive in Human
Interface design and becoming more involved in charity. I just wish they’d
shitcan the lawsuits and get on with making products. Hopefully the HTC
licensing agreement is the beginning of the end of SJ’s “thermonuclear”
tantrum.

The only way to beat the competition is to make products that are too
difficult and costly to replicate – they already use fairly exclusive
materials for their hardware, sophisticated designs and have an unmatched
retail chain - now they need to step up in the software department. They have
the money but need the inspiration.

~~~
FireBeyond
"they already use fairly exclusive materials for their hardware"

What, exactly? As someone who has used an iPhone 3, 4S, iPad 3, and many other
mobile devices, I'm really struggling to think of a material that is "fairly
exclusive" to Apple.

~~~
nickpinkston
They have their own aluminum alloy made specifically for the phone. Custom
plastics, dyes, colors, etc. They've got enough scale/buyer power to optimize
to the n-th.

Not to mention that the A-series processor is Apple only, they get early
access to the best screens, etc.

~~~
ricardobeat
Not to mention they use forging instead of casting for the aluminum bodies,
and have their own white paint formula (most manufacturers don't even bother
trying to make white devices). Plastic was still the norm for PCs until the
"Ultrabook" wave came along.

~~~
schiffern
> _Not to mention they use forging instead of casting for the aluminum bodies_

Apple currently CNC mills all their aluminum bodies.

~~~
nickpinkston
They cold forge, laser cut, CNC mill, bead blast, and then anodize them
actually - there's many processes that go into making such a product.

~~~
pitchups
And what a shame that the majority of users cover it with a cheap,
plastic/rubber case! :\

~~~
nickpinkston
Haha - this actually goes for most products, but Apple is crazy at this type
of thing - buying CNC machines by the 1000s at a time...

To be honest - I think a lot of it isn't the right direction for product
design - it's designed to be HARD to match, so I feel like a flanking maneuver
is required in industrial design to start new aesthetics that will drive
different ways of manufacturing that are most accessible than Apple's current
methods.

------
scottmp10
Google's 20% time was great while I was there. Not everyone takes advantage of
it (which is a good thing in many cases - you shouldn't force someone to). But
it won't be very beneficial at a company as internally locked down as Apple.
It only works when there is open communication of ideas internally. Google,
for instance, has internal career fairs where you can check out less-well-
known projects for 20% or full time opportunities.

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doomlaser
I thought that Google didn't really have 20% time anymore.

~~~
ChuckMcM
FWIW, 20% time was always controversial. I was part of 'the surge' (a big
hiring wave that peaked in 2006 and then died off) and a common complaint was
the low number employees had 100% time (they could work on what ever they
wanted) and high number employees had to get their manager's approval, and
their manager only approved it if it was something the manager needed doing.

Given the nature of that particular 'perk' it was really hard to quantify it
for the employee handbook. I came to believe that it was a sort of test, kind
of like the tests in Starship Troopers where if you did something that clearly
was going to be a Google product or feature then you got points for that, but
if nobody could figure out what use it would be, you got penalized. And the
option was like either +1 point or -10 demerits (i.e. very unbalanced).

So over my four years the strictures on what was or wasn't 'acceptable use' of
your 20% time got more and more constrained. I wouldn't be surprised in the
slightest if the language had morphed into 'if your really a star performer
we'll let you pick your next project' rather than the oft misunderstood 20% to
do whatever you want.

~~~
michaelochurch
Right. If you're above the Real Googler Line, then not only do you have 20%
time, but no one's going to stop you from spending 100% of your time on your
20%T project... it will delay your promotion if your 20%T project isn't
successful, but that's all. Real Googlers don't sweat Perf or worry about
getting fired. They only pay attention to managerial demands when life events
(such as having a kid) increase their expenses and they could really use a
promotion this year. Otherwise, they do whatever they want.

If you're below the Real Googler Line, and most new hires are, your 20%T
project is your 80%T project: appease your manager. Nothing else matters, not
"performance" in the abstract or doing something great for the company. Forget
all those distractions. If you're below the RGL, your job is to please your
boss and serve his career goals. "Peer review" won't protect you, either, if
you're at a lower level, because no one below Staff is taken seriously as a
peer reviewer. (Remember, they aren't Real Googlers.)

The whole story around "Google culture" is based on what Google is like for
people above the RGL, but it takes several years to get there, and it's next
to impossible if you're not at one of the top 3 or 4 campuses.

The Real Googler Line used to be at the Senior rank, but now it seems to be
closer to Staff (and some Staff SWEs seem to be below the RGL). That means
that if you come in at the SWE 3 level, you're two promotions away from it, in
a company where the average promote rate is about 10-15% per year. Unless you
have a star manager who gets his reports promoted like butter, you're wasting
your time.

Google needed to grow a pair and fight to protect its culture from all these
transplant executives who brought in terrible ideas from other companies with
shit cultures. It needed to man the fuck up and make open allocation an
official, unassailable plank of the culture. Now it's too late.

~~~
yuhong
> Now it's too late.

I wouldn't go that far.

------
firefox
Best of luck to the ones "affected" as everyone that I know who works at Apple
are already overworked, stressed and being asked to work while on vacation.

~~~
activepeanut
Indeed.

Ditto for certain groups at Google ( _cough_ android _cough_ ).

Either have a dedicated research group, or give people a pass at being 20%
less productive at their regular job.

Here's a novel idea.. increase your workforce by 20%? I know, that's just
crazy talk. :)

~~~
genuine
You know that part of the reason that Google's interviews are so difficult is
that they can hire younger people that have bright minds, no families, and
that will work crazy hours?

The side benefit is that they have geniuses working there.

------
genuine
We talked about doing this at my last job, and never did. When I read
"...gives a small group of employees 2 weeks or ‘a limited amount of time’ to
work on a project outside of their normal responsibilities at Apple", it made
me think of the same attitude- the inability to commit to full-on innovation
and creativity. Tim Cook, you are a great CEO, but you don't know how to take
sufficient risk to get the reward. _Everyone_ should get the 20% time. Don't
do anything half-assed, ever. Even better would be to 1-up Google and say that
you don't give a flying fuck what your employees do as long as they are
innovating for the company and doing what they love to make people's lives
better.

~~~
michaelochurch
_We talked about doing this at my last job, and never did. When I read
"...gives a small group of employees 2 weeks or ‘a limited amount of time’ to
work on a project outside of their normal responsibilities at Apple", it made
me think of the same attitude- the inability to commit to full-on innovation
and creativity. Tim Cook, you are a great CEO, but you don't know how to take
sufficient risk to get the reward. Everyone should get the 20% time. Don't do
anything half-assed, ever. Even better would be to 1-up Google and say that
you don't give a flying fuck what your employees do as long as they are
innovating for the company and doing what they love to make people's lives
better._

This is an awesome post. I award you with an Indignation:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtCiP8B2xpc#t=7s>

~~~
genuine
Thank you! "Whenever you're ready" is my favorite part.

------
philwelch
This sounds suspiciously like the pipeline of new ideas is running dry.

~~~
bane
I'd write it up this way: Tim Cook is a remarkable individual, but he's not
exactly the fountain of creative ideas that Jobs was (how original those ideas
were is an ongoing debate, but nevertheless). I think it's a remarkably
introspective move, recognizing weakness and moving to rectify it.

Put another way it's much better than the "strategy" of suing everybody who
uses fruit or 4 sided shapes in their products as a hedge against the lack of
creative direction from the top.

~~~
hahainternet
Forgive me if this is pointless cynicism but _fountain of creative ideas_?

* A music player

* A phone

* A portable computer

Not _exactly_ the most innovative product categories?

~~~
philwelch
Do you remember what phones were like six years ago?

~~~
sesqu
Yes; just like they are now, just with bigger batteries and smaller screens.

------
xbryanx
This concept of Bootlegging[1], isn't "Google's" and dates back to the late
1960s. I always think of Post-it notes as the pre-digital poster child for
this sort of internal, yet personal, innovation.

[1] - <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootlegging_(business)>

~~~
tedmiston
Bootlegging is an unnatural term, and has a historically negative connotation.
The definition mentions secrecy and unauthorized projects, yet a few
paragraphs later awkwardly adds a permitted form.

~~~
pyrotechnick
You seem to have confused a few monkeys tapping on keyboards "collaboratively"
for some kind of trustworthy source of definition.

Good thing _Kenneth E. Knight introduced the notion bootlegging in 1967_ ;
well before the gnomes could ever get their filthy mitts near it.

Try not to let a few control-freaks on Wikipedia desecrate your language more
than it already has. You owe them nothing.

~~~
tedmiston
The official definition from Knight's seminal paper "A Descriptive Model of
the Intra-Firm Innovation Process" [1]:

    
    
        "Bootlegging: In some instances the innovator may be able 
        to implement a new idea by keeping the development under 
        cover from the disapproving power in the organization 
        until it is introduced. At that time it may be impossible 
        for the organization to reverse itself."
    

It's reasonable to consider the authority of a Wikipedia entry, but in this
case I believe the maintainers simply modernized "under cover" and
"disapproving power".

1: <http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/2351630>

------
ruswick
Apple is blatantly and abjectly stealing from Google. This is an egregious and
shameless flaunting of the thousands of hours of tireless effort and
innovation that went into crafting Google's unique and beautiful culture.
Pathetic.

/sarcasm

~~~
The_Egg_Man
It's only a matter of time before they patent the 20% Time and sue Google for
it.

------
Surio
I am coming too late into this article (one day old already...), but here's an
observation that stood out for me that I wanted to share here.

Whenever there is discussion on Apple and "invention", I am reminded of this
(somewhat) contrarian opinion piece by Gladwell:--

[http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/05/16/110516fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/05/16/110516fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=all)

Punchline towards the end: _Then Starkweather had a scheme for hooking up a
high-resolution display to one of his new company’s computers. “I got it
running and brought it into management and said, ‘Why don’t we show this at
the tech expo in San Francisco? You’ll be able to rule the world.’ They said,
‘I don’t know. We don’t have room for it.’ It was that sort of thing. It was
like me saying I’ve discovered a gold mine and you saying we can’t afford a
shovel.”

He shrugged a little wearily. It was ever thus. The innovator says go. The
company says stop—and maybe the only lesson of the legend of Xerox PARC is
that what happened there happens, in one way or another, everywhere. By the
way, the man who hired Gary Starkweather away to the company that couldn’t
afford a shovel? His name was Steve Jobs_

------
andrew_wc_brown
Didn't apple use to have an R&D department and one of the first thing Steve
Jobs did when he came back to Apple was he scrapped it?

~~~
drifkin
Whether or not it was scrapped when he first came back, R&D doesn't seem like
a new thing for Apple.

For example, I remember coming across someone working on touch R&D for Apple:
<http://murderandcreate.com/>

From the page:

"In 2007 I started working in research and development at Apple on multitouch
hardware. There I spent my time inventing and patenting new touch
technologies. Now I lead the Human Interface Device Software Prototype group
at Apple."

------
bickfordb
Instead of version, I think it would be more accurate to say 3.8% time (two
out of fifty-two weeks). 20% time would be over ten weeks by my arithmetic.
Although I think it's a generous gesture for a mega cap like Apple, I think
this is a little silly. At a big company such as Apple can't you gain or lose
3.8% of your day simply by shuffling around your coffee break or gratuitous
meeting schedule?

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te_chris
Sounds like a way to give employees leave without actually giving them leave.

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shasta
4% time, then.

------
marksaccucci
I think all companies should encourage this. When I read this, Bell Labs comes
to mind. Bell Labs had a recipe for brilliant innovation and I think all
companies should take note!

~~~
jacques_chester
> Bell Labs had a recipe for brilliant innovation

Government-guaranteed monopoly profits?

Harder to achieve than it looks.

~~~
chimeracoder
> Government-guaranteed monopoly profits?

They also were forbidden from profiting from a large portion of the work that
they did....

If that weren't the case, we wouldn't have GNU.

~~~
1SaltwaterC
We wouldn't have OS X as it is today either.

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philip1209
The font on the website is really difficult for me to read - it causes me to
overly strain my eyes.

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barista
Good for the people who work there but to me this looks like yet another sign
where apple is becoming like the "other companies". No longer think different.

~~~
huxley
I see it more as a sign that "20% time" projects are becoming an employment
benefit, particularly important if Apple is competing with Google for some of
the same talent.

