How they work at Google (Moscow)
For many it is important to feel at work almost as comfortable as at home. Alas, not all companies can provide this. The IT industry has long been known for creative and modern offices, as well as non-standard workflows. Today we will talk about how they work at the Google office in Moscow and how it looks.
The Moscow office of Google is located in Baltschug Plaza and employs about 150 people of various specialties. His concept was to create an office with a real Russian soul. Many walls in the room are decorated with red brick or carved wood, each room has its own special look in the style of Russian folklore or cinema. Whether the developers of the office managed to realize their plans – judge for yourself.
The company publishes information about vacancies on its official website. If you like the position, you can immediately apply for an interview on the site, and the recruiting manager will contact you. It’s very convenient, you don’t have to go to job search sites if you want to work at Google.
The peculiarity of hiring employees is that during the interview, the candidate communicates not only with the manager, but also with his potential colleagues. All Google employees are a team, and its members should feel connected to each other.
Unusual questions are often asked in interviews. For example, how much would you pay to clean all the windows in Seattle, why manhole covers are round, how to explain the term “database” to a 7-year-old child in an accessible way. The purpose of such questions is not to get the right answer (after all, there is no single right answer to many of them), but to identify how the candidate can think creatively and find solutions in non-standard situations.
How they work at Google (Moscow)
The working process
Google is very loose about employee hours. That is, each employee must work the standard eight hours a day, but at what particular hours he will do this, he decides for himself. Some people prefer to work in the morning, others in the evening. No one monitors what employees do in the office either. They can sit half a day in a cafe or play a console. The main thing is the result of the work done, not its process.
Each employee can allocate one fifth of his working time to his own projects. Of course, they should be related to his activities, but they may not be included in the list of direct duties. It is thanks to this principle that the Gmail service was once created.
All newcomers to the team have their first internship at the Dublin office. There they are told about everything that they will need during their work – corporate culture, workflow organization, etc. In the Moscow office, it is also customary to address each other as “you”, and call the interlocutor only by name, without any patronymics and respectful prefixes. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking to a colleague or a boss. In terms of the dress code, everything is also more than loyal – you can come to work in absolutely anything. Of course, within the limits of common sense and decency.
All Google employees also have such an event as TGIF (Thank God It’s Friday – “Thank God, today is Friday”). Every Friday evening, the team gets together and, over a glass of beer, wine or something else, they share news from their professional world with each other and discuss new projects and achievements for the week.
office design
The office is made on the principle of “open space”. In each room, jobs are placed in a chaotic manner. Tables and chairs are everywhere of different heights and shapes, and everyone can choose the place that is convenient for him. Each floor of the office is made in its own style. Since this is the Moscow office of Google, I wanted something originally Russian, and I must say, this is the wish of the employees themselves. For example, one floor is made in the style of the Moscow metro, the other is in the style of Russian fairy tales, films and cartoons.
There are many meeting rooms in the office – where employees can talk to each other or make appointments with guests. There are also meeting rooms for one person – if you need to talk on Skype, so that no one distracts or think in silence. Meeting rooms also have thematic design, and their names are appropriate – for example, “Winnie the Pooh”, “Serpent Gorynych”, “Vrungel”, “Postman Pechkin”, “38 Parrots”, “Twelve Chairs”, “Polyanka”, ” Metro Pushkinskaya” and others.
Dining in the office
You won’t find any paid lunches or coffee or soda machines on Google. The office has a wide variety of food, and it is free for all employees. On one of the floors there is a dining room “Samobranka”. And this name was chosen for a reason – there are always muesli, fruits, berries, different types of cereals, hamburgers, sandwiches, juices, coffee and more on the table. There is no prohibition on drinking alcohol in the office.
