There's been a lot of Google-lit over the past ten years, all of it trying to explain what makes the company tick. Generally I've been immune to reading about it, but it was mentioned as a good book by my mentor for thinking about how a library operates (or could operate), so I decided to give it a whirl. It also doesn't hurt that the book it written by actual "Googlers", not outside journalists (though there is a shadow third author, Alan Eagle).Overall, my biggest takeaway was that hiring the right people is important. I also appreciated the discussions on decision-making and communication, both areas where my current workplace could use serious revamping. I liked the idea of "failing well", knowing that not everything is going to be a runaway success and knowing when to pull the plug, as well as learning from the experience.
The book can be treated as either a handbook or pleasure reading. If you are going for the latter, I recommend reading the footnotes because, more often than not, they make the entire work much funnier. I found that once I stopped trying to draw direct comparisons between Google and the library and just let the text flow, I enjoyed it a lot more. I didn't write in the margins or highlight because (a) it was a library book and that would have been disrespectful, and (b) I tend to mentally store the data and it comes back to me as I need it. I know not everybody thinks this way, but it works best for me.
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