Weird article today in the NYT about Tan Chade-Meng -- an engineer at GOOG that gets his photos taken with every luminary, dignitary, and mercenary that darkens the door of building 43.
What's weird isn't the fact that he gets his pic taken with the likes of Madeline Albright and Muhammed Ali -- What's weird is that these celebs are visiting in the first place. Why is Robin Williams, for instance, schlepping down the peninsula from the confines of his Sea Cliff manor to greet the geek factory? Could it be for the schwag, Mars?
Apple seems to be the only other company that I can think of that gets even a shred of this celebrity cachet, and even that blurs the lines between genuine star interest and the late 90's "Think Different" ad campaign in which Ghandi and MLK held hands while snarfing black & white cheeseburgers at the cafeteria at Infinite Loop. (and by "shred" I mean Bono and Al Gore. Meh.)
Nope. Nobody holds a candle to Sergei and Larry these days.
Maybe it's because GOOG is such an anomaly, even outside the tech space. Each time I've been there, my experience seems to parody itself. Each time I say to my friends that work there, "It can't get any better/weirder than this" but somehow it does. It is so over the top with the gourmet food and espresso stands in every cubicle -- the 'endless' pool in the middle of the quad (always empty) -- and the hardware kiosks where you can just flash your badge and walk away with a Cisco router under each arm.
How do they do it? How do they live up to the hyperbole? Every employee looking so satisfied and earnest? What could possibly be the secret?
I'll tell you what it is. The secret is this.