Many “Big Tech” corporations attract engineers by prioritizing their employees’ well-being as well as productivity. Some have even adopted Teal cultures (LL) and practices (LR) for human-centered collaboration at scale. For example, groups that value psychological safety uncover more – and more diverse – perspectives when brainstorming and problem-solving.
Google’s engineering organization is arguably the world’s largest, most “Teal-ish” collective, embodying Laloux’s Teal principles of self-management, evolutionary purpose, and wholeness. We illustrate these aspects with a case study of Google’s approaches to hiring, collaboration, performance evaluation, and promotion. By applying an Integral lens, we also identify blindspots that arise when advanced cognitive intelligence is not matched by other lines of development. We discuss how that impacts Big Tech’s response to the societal-level challenges posed by social media, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence.
