How Google’s 20% Rule Lets Staff ‘Suppress Management’

Google’s 20% rule has attracted much attention from employees and employers alike – with many people praising the legislation for its innovative approach to work-life balance.

The rule allows Google workers to spend 20% of their time on anything they want, allowing for staff to embolden their creative juices.

However, Entrepreneur reports that the rule also allows employees to “suppress management” – or at least according to Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn’s Co-Founder.
Speaking on the podcast ‘Masters of Scale’, Hoffman explained the rule and how it affects employee-employer relationships.

“If you want to invent something new, or reinvent something at a spectacular order of magnitude, you have to suppress management.

“Let your employees pursue wild ideas that may raise your eyebrows. The interesting thing about 20% time is – although it’s reported as you get to spend one day doing whatever you want – what it really served was a check and balance on the power of the engineering management over the subject.”

What this translates to is employees being able to actively chose when and how to exert their productivity. Hoffman expands on this: “An employee can legitimately look that boss in the eye and say: ‘I’ll give you 100% of my 80% time’.
“That simple principle, which never really happens in practice, but it’s understood, empowers the employee with both dignity, but also some choices.”

Managing employees’ aspirational hobbies and their professional goals fits well within HR’s remit, as it is solving the productivity problem. This rule, whilst allowing staff to flex their creative muscles independently, also puts a check on how managers manage their teams, how they exert their control and how they increase output.

Source: HR Grapevine