我们要向Google学习做人道理吗
华盛顿邮报昨天刊出一篇由一位号称有35年经验在华府工作的社会心理师Douglas LaBier所写的文章「You’ve Gotta Think Like Google」，也就是说「我们都要学习Google思考的方式」。
什么意思?这位心理师的主张是，如果Google是个「人」，那这个叫Google的家伙，他「整体」的处事、思考、工作、待人接物的方式，简直就是一个「心理健全且有竞争力的成年人」的「标准典型」!当然，华府离矽谷太远，心理师本业不是电脑网路，所以对Google的印象只是片面。我诠释他这篇写得有点虚无的文章，得到的重点是：他所看到的Google这个「人」之所以健全，全是因为Google对待已知的合作伙伴，是非常的信任(20%时间、比一般公司又更多的自由)，让这些伙伴可以创新;而他对待未知的其他大众，包括茫茫网海中的其他网民，竟也抱持着让大家一起来做的开放精神。
他认为，基本上，Google是一个懂得「合作」的家伙。
而这个观点很有意思的地方，并不是因为Google竟是一个懂得合作的家伙，而是因为为何一个懂得合作的家伙，在这位资深心理师的眼中，就是一个「最棒的成人典型」、「最成功的上班族」?
心理师认为，办公室或在日常生活中一般认定的「成功口诀」为何?就是能管控压力、目标清楚、奋斗向上……不过，他说，在这个日渐全球化的竞争世代，这样已经「不够了」!
因为，谁不是这样?
多工作几个小时，就会比人家强吗?
这位心理师从头开始讲起，他说，现在大家华尔街崩盘，拣一拣剩下的东西，才看到一些「连结」，才发现家庭是多么重要、朋友是多么重要，大家终于发现，现在的上班族原来太重视「埋头苦拼」，过于「追求自我好处」(focuses too much on self-interest)。他认为，这种奋斗态度已经是「无效的职涯战略」(ineffective strategy)，他反而认为，现在的上班族，应该要懂得「放下自我好处」(subordinate)，我们要学会「忘记自己」，然后用「Google的心态」他人合作，人终究是群居的动物，一个健全的心理，一定要认定我们是住在一个需要相互倚靠的社会，就像体内的器官，都要相互倚赖才达到某种平衡，大家快乐各司其工作，一起做得很好。
他建议几个今天就可以开始训练自己的方法，还蛮实际的：
一、从今起，强迫自己永远只能想到自己与别人的「共同处」，而不是「差异处」。
二、让自己「在家」和「在外」的谈吐完全一致，不要有任何的差别(除了衣服穿得不一样之外)!
三、不要将别人的情绪放在眼里。
这个心理师的一番的「Google比喻」，也证明了，Google在一般大众眼中的印象，就是开放、合作、创意、快乐……尽管 Google这间「公司」至今它只用同一种方法来赚钱，但它在一个「人」的「形象资产」，可能也很有价值了。
但想想，Google今天的形象，大多只是延用网路公司一般的形象;网路比Google还开放的多得是，比Google还热情的多得是，历史来看比Google还自由的也多得是，只是……没有一间曾经高喊到700元的股价。
换句话说，网路界的我们，以及喜爱网路的我们，其实都已拥有「Google」的特质了──
网路人正是：正面、乐观、大方!
正是这位心理师所谈的，「心理健全且有竞争力的成年人」的「标准典型」!
当然，做网站不是在相亲，正面乐观又大方没用，生意要可以损平，股东得到回报最重要，这是大家所要继续加油的地方，但全世界上赚钱的商业模式这么多，「心理健全且有竞争力的成年人」这么少，所以，我们应该保个性去「就」商业模式，而不是拿商业模式来抹杀掉难得的个性，这点是网路界的朋友们都该记得的。
问题是，正面、乐观、大方是我们在讲的，当大家在关起门来成一间公司时，都是这么正面乐观大方、创意至上，但打开门去面对他人，是否也是如此?网路人想想，一天工作时间，花了几个小时在做一件「合作」的事，又花了几个小时在空谈一些诋毁的事?我们的确都要向Google学做人道理，因为以他现在的大哥态势，网路整个都是他的，他只想做酷的东西，不用到Google，也可以拥有一套Google的头脑。网路赐给我们这么棒的一个环境，无论到哪里，我们永远永远都要用这种心情工作下去。
By Douglas LaBier
Special to The Washington Post
Tuesday, November 11, 2008; Page HE01
What are the keys to success and well-being? Being able to manage the stresses of your work and personal life, right? And to cope with the emotional conflicts you brought with you into adulthood.
In the office, that has meant being clear about your goals and working your way up a fairly predictable set of steps to achieve power, recognition and financial success.
But, like the stock market, that dependable formula has taken a nose dive. It's still important to be able to manage conflicts that could derail your career or personal life, but it's not enough anymore. And it alone won't produce success, well-being or sanity in our globalized, turbulent and interdependent world.
The traits you most need today are to be transparent, flexible, focused and collaborative.
You need to adopt the psychology of Google.
I write as a business psychologist and psychotherapist with 35 years' experience who is being confronted more and more often by men and women who are discovering, often painfully, that the attitudes and behavior they thought would lead to fulfillment suddenly leave them at a loss. They don't know how to keep up -- let alone get ahead -- in a world where the only constant is change and where it seems as if everybody has to be skilled at competing and collaborating with everyone from everywhere about almost everything.
We've all become aware of how widespread turmoil can flow from unforeseen circumstances: entirely new global business paradigms that create upstart competitors or put you out of business; social networking technologies that can confront you with other people's pain just as easily as they can broadcast your own flaws worldwide; turbulent shifts in weather patterns, apparently brought on by global warming; the ill-defined threat of terrorism. It's as if we've all, unwittingly, been given roles in the Brad Pitt movie "Babel," in which the actions of two goat-herding boys have tragic consequences for lives on three continents.
I deal with the fallout almost daily: I see people who've functioned pretty well but now feel as if they're standing on tectonic plates that are shifting beneath them.
There's the Wall Street banker who told me he'd always defined himself by "making it through the next end zone" in his career. Now, with his company -- and career -- collapsing, he finds that in addition to sacrificing time with his family, he has sacrificed his health: He has diabetes and high blood pressure. "Kind of a reverse 'deal flow,' " he lamented to me.
And the management consultant, pressured to ratchet up her travel to keep her career on track. "I'd been coping with everything, I thought," she told me, "though I don't like needing Zoloft to do it." Instead of becoming more predictable as she gained seniority, her career was taking her on an even wilder ride. "Now I don't have enough time for my daughter or my husband," she said. "What kind of life is this? . . . My husband's checked out, emotionally. And what am I teaching my daughter?"
These people were on the kinds of career paths that brought their parents' generation rewards they could rely on. But that linear upward climb has become hazardous. That's because it focuses too much on self-interest, which is an ineffective strategy in today's interconnected world and leaves you vulnerable when forces outside your control create unanticipated upheaval.
Having observed changes in the business model -- as people look for value in their work in addition to profit from it -- I've come to believe that employees today need to subordinate self-interest. Qualities we long admired but never thought absolutely necessary, such as cooperation and altruism, have become both survival skills and keys to competitiveness. A psychologically healthy life involves building those qualities into your conduct -- in a sense, learning to forget yourself.
There are specific attitudes and behaviors that will enable you to thrive and that you can use as a guide for helping children prepare for a future that will be characterized more by change than by stability.
If Google were a person, it would be the model of a psychologically healthy adult. Its corporate culture and management practices depend upon cooperation, collaboration, non-defensiveness, informality, a creative mind-set, flexibility and nimbleness, all aimed at competing aggressively for clear goals within a constantly changing environment.
A psychologically healthy adult embraces the notion that all of us are parts of an interdependent whole, like organs of the same body. He or she learns to become proactive, innovative and creative, and wants to keep growing and developing within a changing environment. She values positive connection and is flexible in situations of conflict.
One couple whom I see revamped their relationship by reviewing what they wanted their "life footprint" to be. They realized they wanted a greater sense of connection between themselves and greater satisfaction from what they did. One began a business that had been a longtime dream; the other moved to a company that provided more opportunity for creative expression but less money.
"Sure, there are trade-offs," one of them said. "But the bottom line is better for our lives."
It's human to have self-serving tendencies; it's healthy to keep them at bay. Here's how:
· Focus on what you have in common with others rather than on the surface differences between you. Research shows that you can train your brain to do this, starting by visualizing the world from another's perspective without abandoning your own views.
· Reduce the gaps between your public image and private life. Politicians aren't the only people who risk being tarnished in a very public online forum by their private actions.
· Don't react emotionally to changes that are not about you even if they affect you. Focus your energies instead on creating a realistic strategy for either improving your situation or changing it.
Google, of course, is not only a technological achievement and business model. It's also a creative process. So think for a moment what your life would look like if it were a work of art. When it's finished, what will the picture look like? What purpose will it reveal for your having been here? Do you want to make any changes?
Right now?
