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DEBBIE O'NEILL: Hi, everybody.
My name is Debbie O'Neill, and I'm
on Google's University Programs team.
And welcome to our first Hangout On Air,
live from Google Ireland, which is the headquarters for Europe,
Middle East, and Africa.
So I'm here to host our first ever Hangout On Air, entitled
"A Day in the Life of an SMB Account Strategist."
And I'm joined with some awesome Googlers
from within our SMB organization.
So for those of you who may not be aware of that acronym,
SMB actually stands for small to medium businesses.
And that is the main entry route for any new grad
into our non-technical side of the Google organization.
So, guys, maybe we should do some introductions.
So maybe we'll kick off here in Dublin.
So, Adam, if you want to tell us a bit about yourself.
ADAM DEVLIN: Absolutely, Deborah.
So my name is Adam, and I work on the SMB UKI team based
in Dublin, as Deborah said, the European headquarters.
And we're actually live from the really cool Hangout
in our studio, that is unique to some of the Google offices
across the world.
And so I work on that team, and I basically
help a lot of agency accounts throughout the UK market.
That's basically what I do on a day-to-day basis.
I assume we'll go into that in more detail in a few minutes.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Yeah.
And also we have Isabelle joining us.
Where are you, Isabelle?
ISABELLE: Hello, guys.
I'm in Madeconia actually.
So my name is Isabelle.
I'm French.
I have two kids.
And I'm the manager in SMB Services for all Adriatics,
including Macedonian markets, and all the Baltic markets
also.
And today is actually a great day for me,
because this is exactly my eight years Google anniversary.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Wow!
Happy Anniversary, Isabelle.
That's fantastic.
Here eight years.
Amazing.
Amazing.
Fantastic.
And just a reminder to our viewers, if any of you
are interested in asking us any questions at all,
please feel free to provide in the comment section,
just below, any questions that you might have.
And we really will do our best to try
to cover them during this Hangout with you all.
And so maybe, Adam, our theme for this Hangout
is a day in the life.
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: So maybe it would be great for students
across the Europe, Middle East and Africa region
watching this now, if you could explain to them
what a typical day for you looks like within the SMB
organization.
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, sure.
So you're working week is Monday to Friday,
generally, in SMB sales.
And the working hours are usually 9:00 to 6:00
in the Dublin office, and that's for the UK and Ireland markets.
Obviously if you're working for the French team,
you might start a bit later or a bit earlier,
depending on what hours you actually service.
So I would come in generally at half eight.
And there are three canteens across the Dublin campus,
so I get breakfast there.
And so anyone that's hanging around,
or I'll meet up with a few of the people on my team,
go down and grab breakfast.
Nine o'clock, generally you'd come up and check your emails.
And you'd also check client emails as well as
internal ones.
Then you would have a look at your target run rates,
they're called, so basically your metrics
that you're measured on every day.
And you check how you're doing there, so you can plan your day
and how you're actually going to achieve
what you need to by the end of it.
As well as that, you would look at your portfolio of accounts
that you'll be treating, and try to see which
ones you'll actually be ringing up, and seeing can you schedule
a call with the end clients or the media agency that day
as well.
So it's kind of planning.
So then around 10 to 12 o'clock, you
would start your phone calls.
And so that might involve a bit of cold calling,
so proactively reaching out to clients
that you haven't talked to before.
Or it might involve managing a relationship with an agency
that you've built up over the past year,
just to check in and see how the account is doing,
if they need optimization advice, et cetera.
Then you'd have an hour for lunch.
And so again, we have three cafes across the Dublin campus.
And so you'd be pinging people maybe
from different parts of the organization.
And, by the way, pinging means Gchat,
for any of you that don't know, or Hangouts,
as it's now called, bottom left-hand side of your screen
on G+.
So you have lunch, then you come back.
And then generally you'd have more calls.
And depending how you set up your day,
it could involve scheduled calls that you've already had,
or it could also involve you proactively reaching out
to other clients across your markets.
And beside that, there's always a team meeting to go,
or an agency.
For example, product training I had last week.
So any of the new products that are launching in AdWords,
you're generally briefed on them and quite quickly,
before they go out to market, so that you know about them.
And as well as that, you'll have one-to-ones
with your managers every one or two weeks.
So one-to-one is basically where you sit down and review
your performance, talk about anything
you need to with your manager.
And anything that you might be concerned about,
you would generally be honest and open about it
and talking to them about it.
At then generally towards the end of the day,
you'll be wrapping up, and so closing off emails and then
logging out of your phone.
And then I just go home by six o'clock generally.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Wow, it sounds like a very varied day
that you have.
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, no day's generally the same.
Like you do the same things, but the things don't stay the same.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
I see that we have a newcomer to our Hangout,
so, Anna, nice to see that you could join us.
And so we were just chatting with Adam
about what a typical day looks like for him at Google.
So maybe if you could share some insights in terms of your day
at Google and what that looks like.
ANNA: Yeah, sure.
Hi, everyone.
So my name is Anna, and I'm working for the SMB services
team.
And in my team we support the DACH market,
so the German-speaking countries, Germany, Austria
and Switzerland.
I've been at Google for over three years already,
so I'm kind of one of the dinosaurs in the team.
And what does my typical day look like?
So in the SMB services team, we support
our advertisers, small and medium businesses,
on three main channels.
Our main channel for our customers,
they can contact us for phone support.
We also offer email and chat support.
Chat support was launched actually last year,
so it's like one of the newest features
we offer to our advertisers.
And within our team, we are based in two sites, Wroclaw
and Dublin, and so we work cross-sites.
So our colleagues from Dublin come
to work an hour later than we.
And our phone lines are open for our advertisers
from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM.
So we spend like-- well depending of course
on the tenure on the team and the role
we have, on average about 50% of our time location
on phone support, and on chat and email support.
We answer thousands of different queries from our advertisers,
starting from how to log in to my AdWords account,
and ending with how to implement your marketing track,
for example.
So recently we also started offering support
for Merchant Center-related queries,
that were AdWords customers.
So this is also a new thing for us.
And of course besides the core job, which
is support for our advertisers, some of us
also have some roles in the team like, for example, there
are quality reviewers, or [INAUDIBLE] coaches,
or are responsible for setting up
the workflow for the entire team.
So depending, of course, on the need,
we have a certain time allocation for those roles.
And we also attend meetings for the whole team.
We meet on a one-on-one basis with our managers,
to discuss our performance, our plans, our ideas.
So that would be actually, when it
comes to split up of tasks and responsibilities.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
So, Anna, you mentioned the word AdWords.
And I'm conscious of the fact that we
may have some viewers who don't even know what AdWords is.
So maybe could I have--
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
DEBBIE O'NEILL: --that could explain the AdWords platform,
and maybe the business model that Google has as well.
That could be important for our viewers.
Anybody want to take that?
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, I don't mind.
So for everyone watching, AdWords
is basically Google's platform for reaching people
at the right place and the right time using paid advertisements.
So that means that when you're on Google.uk, Google.ie,
Google.es, whatever country you're in and on the country's
domain, you can generate text ads based on the keywords
that you type in.
So if you're looking for shoes or if you're
looking for a new coat or a new jacket,
the first three results underneath the search dialogue
box will be advertisements.
And at the right-hand side, there'll be about five or six
as well.
So that's basically what AdWords is.
They're actually ads that are generated
throughout the internet on Google's platform.
But probably as well you've seen ads with display images,
or images that use Flash, or engagement ads
or all these different types of things that are actually
not on the Google search engines.
That's also called the display network.
So it's another way that we have to reach other people that
are not proactively looking for a product.
So, for example, if you're on the Washington Post reading
the news, you can actually have ads
to the left and right-hand side from us, and that our clients
have paid for to put their ads there.
And that's basically what AdWords is.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thanks, Adam.
And so one of our mottos at Google
is to do cool things that matter.
So I'm curious to hear from our Googlers,
are there any cool things that you guys have
done that you'd like to share with our audience?
So maybe we'll start with Isabelle.
ISABELLE: Things that I did and I
would like to share with my audience.
One cool thing that I did is that I'm
responsible for all Adriatics markets.
And the three main markets of Adriatics
are Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia.
And one cool thing I'm doing right now
is trying to expand actually these markets
to bring all values in our service
to Bosnia, and Macedonia, Albania,
to expand to more countries, to be able to give phone numbers
and ways to reach to us, to new customers, who can look
like future seeds for emerging markets.
And we [INAUDIBLE] here to actually reach out to them
and say hey, Google AdWords, that exists.
And I think I have a solution for your business.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thank you.
Anna, is there anything that you'd like to share with us?
ANNA: Well maybe what would be worth mentioning would
be this cross-offices program, which is GoogleServe,
a program in which participants are actually
all Googlers from all around the world.
It's taking place every year in spring.
And those are different activities, actually,
in every country.
And here we also are engaged in some local activities, Googlers
from the Wroclaw office.
Maybe what I can mention, for example, one of the activities
we organized last year during last year's edition
of GoogleServe.
Because I run frequently and I really love it--
this is my hobby-- and I managed to engage many people
from the whole office to take part in a charity run,
taking place here in Wroclaw.
And this way we contributed to the charity organization,
collecting money for them and, of course,
did something for us, for Googlers, for our health.
And it was a really cool thing looking
how people trained for this [INAUDIBLE] race,
and we're really happy about that.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Thanks, Anna.
That sounds like it was lot of fun
that you guys had over there in Wroclaw.
And then, Adam, what about yourself?
Any cool things that you've done?
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, I think all Googlers
can be quite different.
When they're hired, they like to do different things,
as you can see from Anna's and Isabelle's answers.
And I think I might give two examples, just
to give a core and non-core role example.
So in the core role, I'm one part
of the sales team for the UK and Irish markets.
So one of the cool things that I'm doing at the moment
is working with my current agency team
to improve our strategy for Q2.
So basically that means, how do we better
treat our clients and our end customers better and quicker?
How can we reach our targets better?
And how can we actually delve deeper into our portfolios
and make the most of it?
And that can get quite complex and complicated,
but it's actually really interesting to work with,
because it gives us scope into project management
and other things that in your day-to-day shop,
you mightn't get as much exposure to as you'd like.
So that's a really cool thing that you can do.
And non-core role, and it goes on
from Anna's point with GoogleServe,
so I would have worked a lot with the Googlers Give team
in the later half of 2013, last year.
And basically what I did is for a week,
we went to a small town in Ireland
to promote the Silver Surfer Towns project.
And so what we did was spent a week,
and we had a stand in a shopping center.
We were going into retirement homes.
We were going to schools to give educational talks
about it, but also to recruit students
to give an hour of their time a week to teach older people how
to use the internet.
And that was really a really cool thing
that we did, because we actually saw the impact that Google
can have in the community, in giving free lessons
and leveraging the kind of community atmosphere
and feeling towards it.
So that was really cool.
I really enjoyed that.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Great.
So it's brilliant to see that work-life balance is definitely
a hot topic within the organization,
and there seems to be a lot of opportunities for Googlers
to do activities outside of their core roles,
which is really cool and unique, I suppose.
ADAM DEVLIN: And as well as that, I
think management expectations for everyone
as well-- like as a Googler, you're
hired into a specific role.
So for example, I'm an SMB salesperson.
And then Anna would be services, and Isabelle
would be a manager.
So we all have our core roles.
It doesn't mean that we're out doing these projects 24/7.
It's a percentage of your time that you have.
So once you become efficient in doing your sales or services
core tasks, you get the chance to go and do
these really cool things as well.
So it's really kind of rewarding in a way.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Yeah, fantastic.
You mentioned there that Isabelle is a manager.
So Isabelle is also, by default, a hiring manager at Google.
So I think our viewers would be interested in knowing what
are some of the core skills and attributes
that you look for in future Googler?
ISABELLE: Well the first thing I would be looking for,
because I'm hiring for SMB services or sales,
is I would like to find somebody who
was able to learn to become an AdWords specialist.
AdWords is quite a rich product, so the first thing
I would need for an ideal candidate
is this person's actually willing to learn and become
an expert in this product.
The second thing I will absolutely be looking for
is somebody who cares.
So we're here to solve issues that our customer may have,
and then to add value and grow their businesses.
So I need somebody who is able to listen.
I need somebody who cares, who can become an AdWords expert.
And then I want somebody obviously
who can be a great team member, team player.
You don't achieve things only as yourself here.
You are working with teams with quite different personalities,
which people who may be like [INAUDIBLE]
you need to be able basically to adapt to each personality,
and to grow with them.
So I think Googliness, leadership, team player,
being able to listen and to [INAUDIBLE].
DEBBIE O'NEILL: So, Isabelle, you
mentioned the word Googliness there.
And oftentimes we live in our own Google bubble.
So maybe if you could explain what Googliness means to you.
ISABELLE: Well for me personally-- because I
know there is no one definition of Googliness.
But Googliness is not only synonymous of being cool.
Googliness, for me, means you're able to do a very efficient job
without thinking of yourself seriously.
So we are having fun.
We're learning every day, but we're also efficient.
And we're nice people basically.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Very good.
OK, great.
So hiring at Google is very much done by consensus.
So everybody as part of the hiring committee
has to agree on a hire.
So I'm curious to hear, maybe from Anna,
what skills or attributes do you think a new Googler joining
your team would need to have?
ANNA: Actually I'm also like one of the interviewers
within our team, so I have a lot of contact with candidates.
And I interviewed recently many people to our team.
So I kind of know what we are looking for.
Well actually, I can only quote what
Isabelle said, because this is actually the key here.
People we are looking for should be,
first of all, very, very open to new things.
Because people in SMB services will
be working with a product that is constantly changing.
This is a constantly changing environment.
And we really need to be always, every day, up to day.
Because sometimes it may happen that a very savvy customer
from an agency will call us, and will
ask us questions about a feature that was actually
implemented a couple of days ago.
And you really need to be very up to date
with the product, the newest features.
And so we look for open people, open-minded people who
are willing to learn, who are great team players, who also
want to have fun at work, because really we
do cool things as a team.
We have joined team events.
We try to go out as often as possible, too,
because recently we got many new team members.
So it's really important for us to integrate with them,
to learn each other, and to be able to work as a great team.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thanks, Anna.
And, Adam, do you have anything additional to add?
Or maybe, you're quite a seasoned interviewer now
at Google.
Are there times when candidates maybe
didn't get through the process for a particular reason, what
typically are those reasons that a candidate might not
be successful?
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, so there's a few things that can happen.
And because I'm hiring for a sales team as well,
myself and the manager will sit down for hiring
and look for sale skills.
And that's the first thing we look for.
And some people may do a really good interview,
but really fall down on the pitching side of things,
or maybe lack experience in an actual target-driven
environment.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: So for the sales team,
you're really looking for someone
that has a passion for sales.
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, and the passion for sales
can be really ambiguous for different people.
For example, some people might be
really outgoing and extroverted, which would suit some clients.
And other people might be really data-driven and introverted,
but can still persuade people on the phone
or have a good level of conversation with a customer.
So I think one thing that students can do,
because I know it's difficult if you don't have
relevant experience on the sales side of things,
or you didn't have an internship in your college program.
But the next time you're giving a university presentation,
or the next time you do group work,
or the next time you present in front of a group of people,
try and do it as a sales pitch.
That will really set you up well for a Google interview.
So instead of presenting the topic
and giving the information, try and build your presentation
around a pitch.
Try and think of how can I sell international business?
Or how can I sell philosophy to my audience?
How can I get them interested?
And how can I get them hooked at the end?
That's probably the best thing you can do,
if you don't have any experience, because then you
can bring that up in the Google interview
and measure your impact.
And that's something that candidates
who have been rejected in the past have fell down on.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: OK, brilliant.
Thanks, Adam.
And so we actually have a question
from one of our viewers.
So Josephine in Madrid asks-- and this is for you, Isabelle.
So she's asking, what does the hiring process look
like at Google?
ISABELLE: The hiring process is quite democratic [INAUDIBLE]
at Google.
What you really usually have is that you
have a panel of interviewers.
So you may get interviewed via phone, via Hangouts,
or you may be coming on site [INAUDIBLE] basically.
But the objective is that a panel of Googlers
will basically ask you several types of questions.
Usually you will have team members,
which is just reflecting the fact that this person will
actually be part of that team.
So I want my team to give their opinion,
like do you want this person to work with you actually?
Plus my team is basically is the best interlocutor
to meet with a new potential person, because they will
be able to ask them, hey, what is it that you do at this job?
What are you doing in your daily life at Google?
So they are here, basically, because they have the best
insight of what is their job, and they
can handle any questions that the candidate may
have about the job.
And then obviously you have me, as a manager, interviewing you
as well.
And at the end of the day, we are striving for the best.
So each interviewer has to be convinced
that you are the best, and has to be
ready to fight for you, basically,
and to say I want this person.
They're the best one.
That's how it works.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thank you, Isabelle.
So maybe, Adam, what exactly will a candidate
go through when they actually apply
online for a position with Google?
What will the steps of that application process look like?
ADAM DEVLIN: Sure, yeah.
So if you apply directly on Google.com/jobs,
you'll be given the application form to fill out,
and your resume.
And if you are successful in that then, the recruiter will
reach out to you to do a phone screen,
so assess your willingness to the job,
do you know what the role is about, very general questions.
If the recruiter deems that you're
to go forward and go through the process,
you'll generally do a phone interview,
which will involve you doing a sales
pitch for the first half of the 30-minute phone call, and then
competency questions and very general interview
questions for the last 15 minutes.
If the person that does your phone interview
thinks that you should be put forward into the next round,
you'll do generally then three on-site interviews.
Or if you're not based in the country where we're
hiring into, it might be a Hangout.
So you'll do it over Hangouts, exactly like we're doing now
on G+.
So you'll do a face-to-face interview over [INAUDIBLE].
Then that's it.
Your job is done, more or less.
The recruiter then will reach out to you with an answer.
Between the on-site interviews and the recruiter
getting back to you, what happens
is a hiring committee meeting.
So all of your interviewers will meet together in a room,
and discuss how the interviews went, and concerns,
and what really went well.
And we make a decision based at the end of that meeting.
And that goes to the recruiter.
And then the recruiter gives you the good news of an offer,
or the good news of a rejection.
If you get the offer-- and I know
this sounds quite complicated, but it's actually very simple
once you know process like I do.
Once you get the offer, once the offer goes off,
it's sent to the executive committee.
So this is a hiring committee based of really senior people
at Google who review the information packs.
So everything that happens right from when you submitted
that application form up until you did your last interview,
hiring committee feedback is collected
into this pack, which is online.
And they will review it.
If they need something else, they will send it back to us,
and then we will reach out to you
if we need more information, or if they need more information
from the interviewers.
And if they approve it, then the offer goes back out to you,
and you can accept the offer or reject it.
But we hope you accept if you get that far.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: OK, so the entire process
start off with an applicant submitting a CV.
So the CV, I suppose, is an area of huge discussion
amongst students.
So do you guys have any top tips for CV
writing that you might want to share with our viewers.
ISABELLE: Well I can take this one.
I mean the first step, I would say,
is like spelling mistake is your enemy.
Like if I'm looking for somebody who has fluent English,
I will expect from you that your CV is spotless and is clear.
I want to make sure that if you give it to an external eye--
and I would actually advise you to do that.
Do your CV or [INAUDIBLE] to make it clear,
and then give it to somebody who is totally different
[INAUDIBLE], and say, what do you understand?
Are you able to understand what actually I have as skills?
And do you understand which type of job I may be looking for?
Like I have candidates sometimes arriving to me,
and I can see in the CV, oh, I'm passionate about marketing.
I want to do my career.
That's why I want this job.
And I'm like, but hey, look.
I'm looking for a customer relationship person.
So why are you pushing to me that you want to do marketing?
Maybe in the future, but right now,
what do you want from this job.
And this I would expect to see it in the CV basically.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Great insight there.
Adam, do you want to add something?
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, I would back Isabelle's point
up on that as well.
When you're giving your CV to a recruiter,
even though it's going to be online interface,
you're actually giving it to somebody who's your audience.
And that's comes back to the sales thing as well.
So if you give your CV to someone,
it should be how you want to be portrayed.
I think one tip that I could give all students watching
today would be, when you're doing your CV,
avoid textbook bullet points on your CV.
Any student can have customer service skills.
But I want to know how you managed to get the customer
service skills, and I want to know
what impact you had with them.
So if you had a part-time job at McDonald's or Burger King,
how did you measure your customer service impact there?
Like what were you doing?
Were you getting orders out five seconds faster?
What exactly was it?
And that will actually help your recruiter
in putting you forward for a sales and services position
as well, because you're actually giving
the good to your recruiter, instead
of he or she having to go back and look for it.
Really, really good tip.
Make sure that you don't have textbook answers.
Now I know in some areas in your CV,
you will have to have kind of more generic stuff.
But if you can have, on each bullet point,
an actual impact that you had, or a percentage, or something
that was measurable, it would be really, really advantageous.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: OK, brilliant.
And, Anna, do you have anything that you
would like to add there in terms of tips?
ANNA: Well I would say like the most important thing is
to understand the role description,
and actually the position candidates are applying for.
And, of course, keeping that in mind,
it is important to include all those attributes that
are required for this role in the CV.
So as was already said, if you have customer service
experience, please tell us.
What actually were your responsibilities?
What actually you did well in your experience
in the previous job?
So how can contribute here within Google
with what you learned so far?
This is important for us, not just the bullet
points like, OK, customer service experience
in this and that job.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Great advice all around here by everybody.
Thank you.
OK, so we actually have a few questions
in from some of our viewers.
And so we have one from Ahmed.
And he's asking if you could provide
some top tips for telephone interviews.
So obviously telephone interviews
differ somewhat to face-to-face interviews.
And so, Isabelle, would you have any top tips
when it comes to telephone interviews specifically?
ISABELLE: I would say the first thing is to be on time.
The second thing is to make sure that the connection is
working well.
Like I'm interviewing candidates who
can be based in Iraq, who can be based in wherever in the world.
So just make sure that we hear you very well,
that you are on time, that you're polite,
that you understand well how long will this interview be,
and that basically if you have any questions,
you will have time to ask them.
Because usually during your interview,
you will have somebody who's there to test the grounds,
to see if you understand the job, to see
if you want to understand the job.
So be honest.
Just tell us what did appeal you in this job,
and why is this job [INAUDIBLE] for you.
I think that's the first step we want to understand.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Adam, do you have anything to add onto that?
ADAM DEVLIN: So I'll just do maybe more on the sales side.
So for a sales phone interview, what we're looking for
is sales flair.
So how you are perceived on the phone,
and on having a perceived amount of confidence and persuasion
to be able to deal with a sales, call maybe 20 calls a day,
in Google.
So that's what we're looking for.
So you might be sitting there going, oh, my God.
I don't have that.
It's OK.
There are different ways that you can prepare for it.
Number one is, if you're the type of person that
is very outgoing, extroverted, and can
talk to an old lady at the bus stop that you don't know,
and what I'd advise you to do there
is have some amount of AdWords public knowledge.
It's really important that if you're
going to be pitching about YouTube or display or search,
that you know something about us,
and that you can build that into your pitch.
And as well as that, be able to handle questions
that we throw back at you in a confident manner,
that you're able to still have control of the call.
The other way out of this as well, if you're
the type of person that maybe isn't as extroverted but you're
quite good in negotiations, or you're good on the phone
anyway, but you mightn't be very outgoing outside
life, which is fine, what you could do there is try, again,
put yourself slightly outside your comfort zone in college
or in some area that you can actually test the water
and how you get on in trying to convince somebody
that you don't know.
That's really important.
And I think that's probably the top tip
I could give for anyone doing a sales interview.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: That's a really good tip.
I hope everybody's taking notes on that.
OK, fantastic.
So, Anna, do you have any top tips for telephone interviews
that you could share?
ANNA: Well I would say be open and be curious.
We like candidates who ask questions.
We actually always inform the candidate during the phone
interview that there will be time, at the end of the phone
interview, for them to ask questions about the role,
about the office, what actually they would like to know,
and what they already didn't know from the recruiter.
So use this time.
Use this opportunity.
We're actually really happy to answer those questions.
And if we speak to a candidate who doesn't ask any questions,
we'll think, OK, so is this person really
interested in this role?
And, of course, get some knowledge about AdWords,
at least like the very basic one.
Be informed what the role is about,
because it may happen that you may get a question,
what actually would you improve about one of Google products?
And when the candidate answers, actually
what bothers me are those ads displayed
above the organic search results, we are like, come on.
This is actually what we are doing here on a daily basis.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: That's good.
Good tips there, Anna.
Thanks for those.
And so we have another question.
Thank you, guys, for submitting your questions.
We really appreciate it.
And so this question comes from Jamie in Madrid.
Can you tell us some of the challenges
that you faced at the beginning of your careers at Google?
And how did you overcome those challenges?
So that's a really great question.
Do we have anyone who'd like to take this question?
ADAM DEVLIN: I can start.
That's a really good question, by the way, and a very good
question to ask at the end of the interview.
Just putting that out there.
That's a really good question.
So for me, it probably would have-- maybe confidence
would have been with me, starting off in sales.
Because I actually worked for a year and a half
on the HR side of Google as well, and then
I moved to sales.
So when I moved to sales, it was a very different area.
And there were a lot of challenges
in terms of a lot of metrics that you were measured against,
and targets.
And then just generally being within that group of 60 people
that had very, very good sales skills.
So basically what I did to combat
that was to reach out to other people that
were quite outgoing on the team and very open,
and were willing to share their sales skills with me
in a very informal manner.
Now everybody is willing to share information at Google
generally, on my team anyway.
I just picked kind of your advocates on the team,
so looked for people that I generally got on with
to see how I could work with them better.
And so it just so happened, a couple months down the line,
we were all sitting together in a pod.
So a pod was a group of six people in a sales team.
And just from there, building that relationship
with people that are sitting around with you,
it was really, really helpful, and also
helps you to network around the sales org as well.
That's one challenge I had starting off
and was able to overcome it.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thanks for sharing that, Adam.
And what about Anna or Isabelle?
Have either of you faced any challenges?
ISABELLE: I started at Google eight years ago,
so the product, like AdWords, that I was already
supporting was already quite different.
But it wasn't so quite rich of a product.
So the first challenge for me, and the main one,
was actually to master the product
and be able, as Adam was mentioning, to adapt every day.
There is not one single day during my career in Google
where I don't have to learn something new,
and to adapt to something unexpected.
So I think that was my main challenge when I started here.
And the best way to overcome it is actually to ask questions,
to be curious, to work as a team.
So when you're starting, you're usually
assigned what we call a buddy.
And a buddy is basically another team member
who has been in your shoes not that long ago, had
a million questions and didn't dare ask them.
So he's actually there because he understand exactly
your thoughts and which type of challenge you may have.
So I think the best way to solve this challenge is actually
to ask a million questions.
You go to your buddy.
And then after a while basically, you
will be the one teaching others.
You will be the one listening to the thoughts and the questions
of other, what we call Nooglers-- so new Googlers.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
Thank you, Isabelle.
And Anna, what about yourself?
Any tips?
ANNA: Well maybe what I could share is when I started,
I spent about three months, my very first three months
at Google, approving ads our advertisers were submitting.
And the biggest challenge for me that time
was actually learning, as fast as possible, all those Google
advertising policies, which was really
a very difficult task, because there were
many, many pages of exceptions, and of exceptions
of exceptions.
And actually when I was realizing
that what I will approve actually
depends the success or failure of a business,
of an advertiser, I was really afraid of clicking the Enter
in the system.
So that was the biggest challenge at the beginning.
And maybe like a smaller thing I could mention,
but it was actually something like very internal.
When I joined my very training in Dublin,
the so-called Googler training, I
was like afraid of all those abbreviations
people were using.
I was like, oh, my God.
What is this all about?
And I was like asking people around, OK,
what does this abbreviation mean?
What does that abbreviation mean?
But, of course, sooner or later this
won't be any surprise for you.
And everything comes time, and you learn it.
So this is just the stress of the beginner.
Nothing more.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Absolutely.
It's all a learning curve in any new job, no matter what.
So we're getting questions in, fast and furious,
which is fantastic.
And so we have a question from-- I think it's Murto.
Apologies if I'm not pronouncing it correctly.
So how long does the hiring process take at Google?
I think I might be able to take that question.
And so from the point of submitting your application
and getting to phone screen stage, from then
it takes about six to eight weeks for the entire process,
and for application to actually an offer being extended.
So I hope that answers your question.
And then we also have another question from Maria.
And Maria actually says, great insights, which is good.
And thanks, Adam and Anna and Isabelle.
The tips about your experiences are great.
What do you value more from the application?
Previous work experience?
Or the attitude and willingness to obtain new skills?
So which is valued more?
Previous work experience or the willingness
to obtain new skills?
What do you value more?
ADAM DEVLIN: I would say both, and the reason
why I'm saying that is the skills and the work experience
that you've learned so far should
help you acquire new skills.
So really like previous work experience-- again
this goes back to the CV question,
like what impact did you have.
And when I say impact, I don't mean
that you went in and shook up the whole business.
I mean what measurable impacts did you have,
no matter what your job was in the past,
is what I'd be looking for.
And based on that then, we'll ask you hypothetical questions
or certain questions to put you in the mindset of somebody
who's at Google already, and test
to see what your answers are on obtaining new skills.
So I wouldn't be too worried about preparing for those two
areas.
I would just know your previous work experience,
and what you did there really well.
And I'd also have kind of an idea of what new skills
you would like to acquire in the role you're
applying for while at Google.
So the answer is both.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: OK, so it's both for Adam.
And Isabelle or Anna, did you have anything to add?
Or do you feel the same as Adam?
ANNA: Well I would say that the willingness
to obtain new skills is more important here, especially here
within the services team.
Because the experience shows that we
have really people with many backgrounds,
and who were working in different companies before,
not especially in the customer service.
But they really love the way they're
working right now, and actually that was all just
a matter of learning, this attitude, these new skills.
So I would say here we do value the second thing more.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Super.
And what about yourself, Isabelle?
Have we lost Isabelle?
OK, so we'll move on anyway.
And I think we might want to wrap up things early, soon.
And is there one piece of advice that you
would want to give our viewers in terms of maybe getting
into the online digital landscape,
in terms of maybe for internships or full-time rolls.
Any piece of advice that you might offer?
ADAM DEVLIN: Yeah, for digital landscape,
I would say look at what your current hobbies
and interests actually are, and how could
you add a digital slant on it?
So if you're involved in your local football club,
or if you play tennis, or you're a real gym bunny,
how could you actually add that to the digital sphere
if they don't have a presence, or how would you
improve it already?
That will give you a real edge going into any interview
for an online company, because you're actually
interested in the industry.
And it will also help you develop your skills as well.
And for a career at Google, I'd back up Anna's point as well,
about being open to learn new things,
and always treating yourself that you
can improve every day in your career.
I think if you come in with an attitude that I'm great,
and you don't necessarily want to obtain new skills all
the time, it might hamper your performance.
And you actually mightn't enjoy your time
as much as you would if you thought
that you could improve all the time as well.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: So you mentioned there
about kind of creating a profile that's
more digitally orientated.
And so actually for those of you watching who may not be aware,
we actually have something called the Google Online
Marketing Challenge, which I think
is a good thing for students who want
to get involved in the digital factor.
So and student groups of between three- to six-student teams
are actually given $250 worth of free AdWords
spend to manage an AdWords campaign
for a small to medium business that does not yet
have an account with ourselves, or an AdWords account.
So that's something that has actually recently launched.
And if you Google it-- excuse the pun-- if you Google
the Google Online Marketing Challenge,
it'll be the first search return that you'll see,
and you can read all about it online.
And that might be something that you should maybe
consider doing and taking part in.
It's a lot of fun.
And, Anna, do you have anything that you'd
like to add in terms of tips and advice, just finally?
ANNA: Well I would just say include as much information
as possible about yourself-- what you've
done on a professional level, but also what are your hobbies
and interests, and what your impact is
in the local environment, even in a group of your friends.
Because those are actually things
that matter for us-- people who are engaged
not only professionally, but also outside of work.
And be creative when it comes to your CV.
Just be creative.
We really like it.
Also, on one hand, stick to the most important information
we are looking for, like what was
your impact in that particular role.
But also, creativity is a very important factor.
We had CVs including links to some videos.
That was a really cool thing, to watch them.
And those candidates, actually this
creates a special bond between candidate and the interviewer.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: So when you talk about impact,
do you mean maybe adding metrics to a CV?
Is that what you would encourage.
ANNA: Yes, definitely yes.
At Google we love numbers.
So it is always welcome.
DEBBIE O'NEILL: OK, fantastic.
Great.
And what about yourself, Isabelle?
Do you have any last pieces of wisdom
that you'd like to share with our audience who
are interested in developing a career
within the digital landscape?
Do you have maybe one piece of advice for our viewers?
ISABELLE: I think when I am interviewing somebody
for Google, I would expect that the person would
listen to my question, and really
answer just that question.
I got a lot of candidates in the past--
and I run more than 200 interviews in total
in eight years-- who are just-- they prepared everything.
They prepped.
They are ready.
They have so much input to give me of themselves.
But hey, guys, I'm asking you one single, simple question.
Could you please consider it as a whole,
and answer each part of it.
And if you have any doubts about what I mean, hey,
simply ask me. [INAUDIBLE].
Sometimes we have candidates who are surprised by our questions.
And if you're Googling basically interviews in Google
on the net, you would see a lot of [INAUDIBLE] questions.
There are a lot of myths about the type of question
you might get in Google.
I'm not here to trick my candidates.
But I may ask you a question where
I know there's no simple answer.
What I want to see as a manager is
how you're going to think about it.
Ask me a question about it.
Process.
What will be your reasoning?
And how are you going to prove your point to me?
DEBBIE O'NEILL: Fantastic.
So I just want to say a huge thank you to Isabelle, Anna,
and Adam here in the Dublin office, for taking part today
and for sharing all of your wonderful words of wisdom
to our student audience across the Europe, Middle
East, and Africa market.
And just a little reminder to our audience.
We do have a survey link on the event page.
And this is our first time doing a Hangout On Air,
so we would really appreciate your feedback
that you might have.
It's super important.
So please do, and complete that survey.
And if you are interested in any of our internship or full-time
opportunities, the link is google.com/students/emea.
And EMEA stands for Europe, Middle East, and Africa,
in case you were curious.
So thank you, guys, and it was a pleasure
hanging out with everyone today.