If you follow the tech industry you probably noticed Google’s decision to shut down their much-ballyhooed Google Wave after only one year of operation. You might also have noticed the “wave” of criticism from technology bloggers and industry writers that immediately followed.
For those not familiar with it, Google Wave is a real-time collaboration tool that combines various forms of online communication. Some industry experts predicted that it would dramatically change the way we communicate and collaborate online. But it never developed the user base that Google anticipated, so they decided to pull the plug on the product.
According to their blog, Google will continue to maintain the site through the end of the year, and will extend the technology into other Google projects. But they will cease all development of Google Wave as a standalone product.
Many industry writers took Google to task for this decision. Why did they shut it down after such a short time? How could they misjudge the market so badly? And with all their talent, creativity and resources, how could they make such a costly blunder?
I disagree. I say good for Google for recognizing a mistake and knowing when to cut their losses and move on!
Far too often, companies stay the course when the evidence overwhelmingly indicates that a sharp turn is required. Even experienced business leaders will frequently bury their heads in the sand and plow ahead with a product or service that the market clearly doesn’t value. In this case, to their credit, Google saw the writing on the wall and made the tough decision to terminate the Wave.
I also say good for Google for having the courage to fail.
Failure is an integral part of innovation, especially the kind that disrupts markets. If you’re not willing to take risks and experience failure, it greatly reduces your chances of coming up with real breakthrough products or services.
Why do most companies have a hard time admitting failure? The easy answer is that people don’t want to look bad. Or they fear losing their jobs. Or they keep thinking that if they stick with it, success is just around the corner. But there’s more to it than that.
Admitting failure requires us to challenge some of our most basic assumptions about ourselves and our notions of success. It requires that we examine the way we think and make decisions, an often uncomfortable and unsettling process.
For example, a common theme in many product failures is overconfidence in (or inaccurate assessment of) our own abilities. The underlying assumption is that we’ve thought through everything about the product, so there must be something wrong with the market, the customer, the economy, the timing, etc. In other words, it’s not our fault.
Another common assumption, and one that is deeply embedded in our culture, says that hard work and persistence will eventually win out. This often goes hand-in-hand with the assumption that we’ve invested so much time and money in the product that we can’t afford to quit. Month after month the market indicates that it doesn’t value the product. Yet we keep thinking that we just need a little more time to make it work.
Perhaps the most difficult assumption to overcome is the idea that behind every product failure lies a simple answer. In our increasingly complex world, we crave simple answers. So we seek to blame failures on one thing going wrong versus a combination of factors. More often than not, however, careful examination uncovers a host of reasons for the failure, not the least of which are our own misguided assumptions about our customers and our markets.
I also give Google credit for how they’re handling the situation. I don’t see any heads rolling or fingers being pointed. I don’t see any public hand wringing or browbeating.
And I don’t see any signs of “We’ll never do that again!” Instead, Google has simply made a decision to cut their losses, learn from the mistakes, and move on.
This no-nonsense attitude sends a powerful message to employees and the general public that Google values innovation and considers it an integral part of how they do business. More important, it shows they are willing to take risks and accept the consequences when they don’t pan out.
Others may chastise Google for pulling the plug too soon and missing the mark so badly with Google Wave. But I applaud their good business judgment and their willingness to fail – two leadership skills we could all use more of!
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Holly is the CEO of THE HUMAN FACTOR, Inc. (www.TheHumanFactor.biz) and is a highly sought after and acclaimed speaker, business consultant, and author. Her unique approach to creating strategic agility, helping others go slow to go fast, will change your thinking.
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Thank you for pointing out such an important point Holly. I think the single most important element of Google’s example here is the response you described, “Google has simply made a decision to cut their losses, learn from the mistakes, and move on.” It reminds me of Edison’s advice to learn from all we do. As it was taught to me, there is no failure, only feedback.
I can’t help but wonder if this “failure” was essentially engineered from the start. Google Wave is a colossal piece of architecture that is more infrastructure than end product. Given Google’s joyful embrace of running everything as a beta for long periods, I keep suspecting that this was exactly what they wanted.
Rather than trying to get a complete product out the door to be met by the wolves of competition, Google has rolled out and road-tested Wave, Buzz, and a strangely managed Google Voice. They also have acquired a slew of companies like Jambool (gold system for gaming), Like.com (visual search) and several others. Now these products (mostly of a social nature) have been individually tweaked, and many dismissed as lessons in business. To me, it seems probable that whole ensemble, including Wave, will be reunited as an integrated platform, perhaps as the social media equivalent of GoogleApps. (I don’t think that Google will make the mistake of letting Facebook define the playing field.) This seems even more likely since the “leak” of the GoogleMe platform.
Rather than just being a solid philosophical approach, do you think that these perceived failures might be a more intentional element of their business model? By any chance have you come across other companies who have used a similar strategy?
Thanks again for a wonderful post!
I have the luck to assist a month ago to a seminar where 20 differents company talk about innovation and the ‘need of failure’, but just 1 of them actually talk about this own failure. Is great to talk about it, but hopefully anhoter one fail, not me…
I have spent some time as an engineer in my career. I have a few items here and there that I have reluctantly thrown out after realizing that an idea was a failure. But that is the cost of innovation. Who cares. Edison spent fortunes finding the right material to put into the filament of an incandescent bulb. Any engineer worth his salt BETTER have some failures on his project work bench to accompany his successes or its means he isn’t “stepping into the dark” – outside lines of convention, where true innovation really happens.
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