Google Grouplets: Shared Groups Of 20% Time

Oct 22, 2007 at 8:57am ET by Barry Schwartz

The Google Way: Give Engineers Room from the New York Times gives us some more insight into how engineers work at Google. We all know about Google’s “20% time,” where Googlers are given 20% of their time to work on ideas that interest them. But there is also the concept of “grouplets” at Google, where a group of engineers who share interest in the same idea work together to make that idea become a reality, all within their 20% time.

The article explains that these grouplets are nothing formal; in fact, they have no budget and no decision-making authorities, but they do have the same passion. Grouplets include Fixit grouplet, Customer Happiness Fixit, Testing grouplet, and others. Matt Cutts, a Google engineer, also blogged about his personal favorites.

Matt said he personally loves the Fixit grouplet, where they have “fixit days.” Plus, Matt gives us insight into the “Testing on the Toilet” sign at Google.

Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here.

See more articles by Barry Schwartz >

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