The Chamber’s Innovation Series on 21 March was hosted by member Google at their Asia Pacific Headquarters at Mapletree Business City II.

More than 100 members attended an insightful and engaging talk by Ms Sapna Chadha, Head of Marketing, Google India & Southeast Asia, on how Google creates and sustains an innovative workplace culture. Sapna shared many unique examples of how Google keeps its pipeline of innovation going by tapping on its employees for new ideas. These include:

• 20 Percent Time: One of Google’s most famous management philosophies that allow employees to devote one-fifth of their time working on a Google-related passion project of their choice, without any questions asked.
• Google Moderator & TGIF: Google Moderator is a tool designed by Google’s engineers that lets anyone ask a question on any company issue for fellow Googlers to vote. Questions with the most votes will be answered directly by the company’s founders and most senior executives at TGIF, their weekly town halls
• Flexible Workspaces and Employee Benefits: Hot desking, plenty of open meeting areas, a massive cafeteria where breakfast and lunch are provided free of charge to Googlers, well-stocked micro kitchens spread out across the office building – all deliberately designed to encourage employees to collide and bump into each other, especially across departments. The idea is that these casual interactions and discussions will spark innovation and encourage employees to think beyond their job scopes.
• Think 10x: The guiding inspiration for Googlers which challenges them to think about how they can improve by what they do by a factor of 10 times, rather than 10%. This forces employees to completely reimagine how to approach their ideas and results in revolutionary change.

Members were also treated to a tasty breakfast spread and a fun, guided tour of Google’s incredible office space.

The Chamber would like to thank the Google team for their warm hospitality and generously sharing their best practices. Do keep a look out for the Chamber’s next Innovation Series event with DBS Bank on 22 May 2018. More details will be announced soon.