> I found it quite frustrating how teams would be legitimately actively pursuing ideas that would be good for the world, without prioritizing short-term Google interests, only to be met with cynicism in the court of public opinion.
This is part and parcel of working for a visible/impactful organization. People will constantly write things, good and bad about the organization. Most of them, good and bad, will be wrong. They'll be based on falsehoods, misinterpretations, over-simplifications, political perspectives, etc.
This becomes a problem when people in the company assume that because most of the feedback is nonsense, that all of it is nonsense. That is especially temping when the feedback is hurtful to you or critical of your team or values.
I found a bit of Neil Gaiman's MasterClass very helpful when reading such feedback. Very roughly Gaiman said that when someone is telling you something doesn't work for them, and what you should do to fix it, you should believe them that it doesn't work for them, but that the author is much better placed than the reader to know how and if to fix it.
In my context I try to understand why someone is saying something, what information I can take from it, and whether there is anything within my expertise, control, or influence that can or should be done about it.
(If you take anything from this comment, I think it should be to go listen to Neil Gaiman talk about anything!)
This is part and parcel of working for a visible/impactful organization. People will constantly write things, good and bad about the organization. Most of them, good and bad, will be wrong. They'll be based on falsehoods, misinterpretations, over-simplifications, political perspectives, etc.
This becomes a problem when people in the company assume that because most of the feedback is nonsense, that all of it is nonsense. That is especially temping when the feedback is hurtful to you or critical of your team or values.
I found a bit of Neil Gaiman's MasterClass very helpful when reading such feedback. Very roughly Gaiman said that when someone is telling you something doesn't work for them, and what you should do to fix it, you should believe them that it doesn't work for them, but that the author is much better placed than the reader to know how and if to fix it.
In my context I try to understand why someone is saying something, what information I can take from it, and whether there is anything within my expertise, control, or influence that can or should be done about it.
(If you take anything from this comment, I think it should be to go listen to Neil Gaiman talk about anything!)