Google is Taking Over the World...

... not really, but it is a catchy title to get you to read my blog post.  In the article "How to Get a Job at Google" (2014, Friedman) author Thomas Friedman discusses the things that Google looks for when evaluating candidates for employment.  He speaks with Lazlo Bock, head of people operations at Google, essentially he is in charge of hiring people.  Mr. Bock lists five attributes Google looks for:

1. Cognative Ability (the ability to process information rapidly)
2. Leadership (the ability to step up and lead, and as Winston Churchill said, "what it takes to sit and listen")
3. Humility (The ability to fail, and not let it destroy you)
4. Ownership (Stepping up and taking charge, but also, stepping back if someone else has a better idea)
5. Expertise (this one is not as important as the others, someone with the four above traits can easily learn specific job task expertise after being hired)

As I read the article and pondered the five important attributes I couldn't help but think of Blooms Revised Taxonomy.  Blooms has been around for decades, since the 1950s to be a little more specific.  During the 1990s a former student of Bloom revisited the taxonomy and it was changed to a verb phrasing schema:

1. Creating
2. Evaluating
3. Analyzing
4. Applying
5. Understanding
6. Remembering

So how did I begin to think of Blooms while reading about Google's hiring practices?  Simple.  Google is interested in what a person CAN potentially accomplish.  Their past actions and accomplishments, while exciting and good for them, is in the past.  Our students, and future members of the workforce, need to be able to consistently produce, and learn, at a high level.  Last year I had the privlege of attending the CUE conference in Napa.  I can't honestly remember the full name of the presenter for one of the sessions, mainly because the original presenter didn't show up and his friend Joe took over the presentation.  Besides being one of the best sessions of the conference, he said something similar to what Bock said.  Joe said that as teachers it is important to teach our students how to learn, unlearn, and then relearn new information throughout their lives.

It takes cognative ability to create a product.  True Leadership and Ownership are necessary to fully Evaluate their end result, and Analyze any mistakes and fix the problems, even if the problem is the direction the leader chose for the group.  This is where humility comes in, a leader needs to be able to look at the evidence without any ego involved, then apply the solution to a problem.  Expertise is where Blooms comes together into one cohesive package, expertise is the end goal, the learning objectives.  When a student successfully completes the task they will have demonstrated a majority of Blooms Revised Taxonomy and the main characteristics Google looks for in potential employees.

(2004). Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is ... Retrieved June 22, 2015, from http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/winstonchu161628.html.

Friedman, T (2014, February 22). How to Get a Job at Google. The New York Times. Retrieved From: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/23/opinion/sunday/friedman-how-to-get-a-job-at-google.html?_r=2.

Revised Bloome Taxonomy. 1st ed. Arlington: N.p. Web. 22 June 2015.

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