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Welcome to The Culture Code podcast. On this podcast, you’ll learn how to grow, shape, and sustain a high-performance culture with the CEO of LEADx, Kevin Kruse. From designing and delivering highly effective leadership development programs, to measuring and improving the employee experience, you will understand what it takes to cultivate a thriving company culture. Through interviews with Chief People Officers, deep dives into key topics, and recordings of our invite-only community sessions, we bring you cutting-edge, data-backed insights from the most desirable companies to work for in the world.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Hello, everyone! I'm Kevin Kruse. Welcome back to the culture code. Our guest today, I'm very excited. Super innovative company. The Chief People Officer at Waymo, Becky Bucich. Becky, welcome! And where are you joining from today?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Hey! Great to be with you today, Kevin. I'm here in Mountain View, California, at our headquarters for Waymo.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Fantastic. I'm on the East Coast, but I had escaped into the San Jose area for about a month in September to soak up your better weather and all that the Silicon Valley has to offer.
For those who might not be familiar with [your company], how big is your organization and in plain language, what do you do?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Sure. So I couldn't be more excited about our mission as a company. We're an autonomous driving technology company with a bold mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to get where they're going. And we're building really this technology that's designed to scale across multiple driving environments. And, you know, the most challenging of use cases. So all use cases. And really, our technology has enabled us to be the first company out there to offer autonomous trips to members of the public, to our community, and in a 24 by 7 kind of way. And, you know, this is around the clock, multiple metro areas, including, if you're in the airport in Phoenix, you can hail a ride. It's pretty cool when we think about our company. Really, safety is at the heart of everything we do. And that's what I'm so proud of, because we're building a technology that's going to make it safer on our roads. We're super conscientious about this, and we want to bring it to more people and more places. Today, we have approximately a little over 2,000 Waymonauts. Waymonauts is what we call our Waymo employees, and we are a subsidiary of Alphabet for those who might not know. We started as the Google Self-driving Car project.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah. So I love this. And again, you're probably laughing because I keep doing these clarifications. Anyone in tech is gonna know that story, right? But not everybody outside knows. So Google, now Alphabet, is an incredibly innovative, autonomous vehicle platform. And I'm glad you mentioned Phoenix as an example. People don't realize you can get in a self-driving car in Phoenix, you can get in a self-driving car in San Francisco. I mean, this isn't in the lab, you guys have now taken it out of the lab, and it's starting in the cities, and that's pretty wild. I also love that you emphasize the mission. I won't go deep into this and bore you, Becky, but I happen to get a vehicle recently that has pretty good full self-driving capability that I've been playing with, and I've been surprised at how good it is, the technology. And yet when I told my 82-year-old father about this, he was horrified, you know, about how this is unsafe and all that. I'm like, no, no, Dad, this is making driving safer, like, you know, this is the mission, it's about safety. And I don't know about you, Becky, when I see all the distracted drivers and everything else going around me, I look forward to the day when we're all being shuttled around in Waymo cars. I'm gonna feel much safer when that day gets here.
Becky Bucich - Waymo: It's just wonderful to hear, Kevin. Couldn't agree with you more.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: So we're here today to talk about culture. And I'm fascinated because Waymo's a pretty exciting company. Can't even imagine what that culture's like, and I'm sure you mentioned the way Waymonauts. They get that right.
Becky Bucich - Waymo: That's right, Waymonauts.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: How would you describe your company culture in just a few words?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: You know, it really comes down to three words or three, I guess, phrases, and I'll kind of get into each one. The first one is mission-driven. The second one is safety and accessibility. And then I'd say the third one is stronger together. When I think about the culture and the mission and values. So for us, when you think about mission-driven, our Waymonauts, as we call them, we are truly driven by the why. Why did we join the company? And we're really intentional about understanding why, starting from day one in the interview process. You know, how do we select folks? We want to understand why people are choosing Waymo, what motivates them. And then you see that further explored when we think about our new hire orientation and our new hire cohorts, I should say, and the discussions that they have. So that's one for mission-driven. Second is safety and accessibility. It's like what we do every day. It's all about safety as our foundation, and I'm so proud of that. And I think it also starts with our orientation. We're very intentional. There's a section called "What Drives You," and I still remember my first day at Waymo, over four years ago, in my orientation, where we each shared why did we join Waymo? And for many, it is so personal, and the stories are so touching. You know, it could be a family member who is not independent, might not be able to get behind the wheel, and so how that brings their independence to life, how they can actually do things every day. But it could also be that some have had the tragic loss of a loved one. And so it is just so important to them to bring technology such that we're not losing lives like we are today from traffic accidents, and what could be avoided with our technology. And then I would say the third really gets into that "stronger together," and it's something you see every day in the culture and how we operate. It's that culture of collaboration and what people are doing together to bring Waymo technology to the world. And it's solving the most challenging problems together. It's having that psychological safety to do that, knowing that you are never by yourself on some of the most challenging, you know, day in and day out things that we are working on together. And so I think it's knowing that you have extremely talented peers next to you who are also going to help you.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: What are some of the ways you foster or sustain this culture? Any unique rituals or traditions related to your culture?
Becky Bucich- Waymo: Yeah. I think, you know, when I think about how we bring it to life in our normal team gatherings, we call them "teamsync." And if I think about the pandemic as an example, it was a time of unification. It was the touchstones of what is so great about our culture and this moment of challenge that we can all take strength from. That was just one example of taking our regular, we call them team syncs, our employee gatherings, and talking about our values. We've evolved that now to this thing called the "Waymo way," which is a celebration of waymonauts who live our values every day. It's lifting up their stories because they are what I would call our culture carriers. It's showcasing which also teaches others. I think the things they are doing to really help Waymo move forward. So that's one area.
Second, I think it's through this real spirit of volunteerism and giving back in the communities in which we operate. We have something called "WaymoServe" where employees across the country are encouraged to volunteer as a team and support their local nonprofits. I'm just so grateful that we set aside time for employees to volunteer in the communities. Just this past fall, some of the engagements we did with nonprofits were like Compass Family Services in San Francisco, the South LA Teen Tech Center, and Mothers Against Drunk Driving in Arizona. These are just a few. But we always make sure, on a regular basis, that our employees can engage in efforts, whether it's participating in the local food bank or a donation drive. This fall we delivered backpacks to schools. I think that spirit of volunteerism and engagement in the communities in which we operate is critical and something we do day in and day out.
Lastly, I'd say it's really about accessibility. I think about accessibility in the community, in particular, when we launched "rider only" in San Francisco. Our Co-CEO, Tekedra Mawakana, did it in a local publication and all the local publications in San Francisco. It wasn't just about reaching a broader audience like the San Francisco Chronicle but thinking of the micro-communities in areas within the city. Thinking about Sing Tao, which is a Chinese language publication. We consider those micro-publications in the San Francisco area because we know we are building for the world. It's not just for one individual. We want feedback from across the user base in different cities. Those are just a few of the things that I think about when building culture. I think about how we're doing it, you know, through our employees day in and day out. These are just a few examples.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Becky, can you go deeper on lifting the stories of your culture carriers? The way, you know, is that like when you hear something, and it gets put in the newsletter or is that recognition at an awards ceremony? What does that mean?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Yeah, I mean, I think it has to be part of real life. And so we ask folks to share those stories. So this past week there were, you know, three individuals that were highlighted, and it was through a publication that we have. We send an email out to them, to the whole company. That's the Waymo way. And it talked about those individuals and what they did. And it was pretty amazing, because it was not just like, "here's what they did." But then it was a little bit of background about the individual, what makes them tick. And it was also us getting to know that person. Because I think when you have that human connection, it just really brings a story to light. And then we take that story and lift it up as well through our team, sync or employee gathering, because sometimes it's not just about putting it in an email. But it's about talking about it, because I think when you have storytelling, it needs to be brought to life in different ways, you could say.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: How often do you do the team syncs?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: They're on a consistent basis, at least once a month. But what you do is you have a lot of teams, like mine, come together on a more frequent basis.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: I love that.
70% of engagement is correlated to the manager, and front-line managers touch more employees than any other leadership group. What are some of the ways you develop your front-line managers?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: I couldn't agree with you more about managers. It's so important to develop. And when I think about it, frontline managers are just fundamental. You know, people go home every night. They're talking at the dinner table about their experience at work that given day. How and there, it's often the manager who is that pivotal person who's either making or breaking their experience. And it's how they feel valued. It's how the work that they're excited about or not excited about. And so we understand how essential that is. And I think for us, it starts also with when we have folks who come into the role because they've been promoted. And they're taking on people management responsibility for the first time, or they're coming from outside the company. Maybe they've managed for a long time. We kind of don't assume anything. We don't know what they've learned to that point. And so we have all of our managers go through a new manager orientation. And it's after about three weeks of joining the company, we really want them to understand. Okay, you've been to our, you know, orientation, and you understand it. You've gone in our car, and you've experienced the ride, the riding experience, if you will, but it's then really getting them grounded on. What are our manager philosophy, and what are our manager expectations? And we establish clear manager expectations for Waymo, developed by Waymo, for Waymo. And those are expectations which we want each of our managers to live by. And then there's quite a few resources behind each expectation in terms of here are the ways. Maybe you're really good at this one. But you're not as good at this one. What are the ways you can learn and grow and develop further? So I think that's first off. Let's not assume anything, and let's ensure we have a good foundation from which we start for all of our managers. And then I think from there we do quite a bit of, we're a startup. We do quite a bit of just-in-time training, as well, knowing that if a person is thinking of it now with a performance management cycle. What are we doing to help them in those moments when they're delivering feedback? Or if, for example, we're now doing our employee engagement survey. We have the results. Let's do training specific to that. What are you doing now next with your team at this given moment? And then sometimes we'll bring manager circles together where you can learn from another manager who has the wisdom of experience, and that's especially useful for newer managers. So those are a few of the things that we're doing really, to think about managers and how we grow and develop them at the company.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: So if I understood you, if I, Kevin, get promoted from individual contributor to first-time manager, it's more or less mandatory to go to this program the next time it's offered, right?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Yeah, we offer them on a quarterly basis. So it's something that we take pretty seriously, and they're not just there once a year or something, but they're there continuously, and we always ensure the manager of the manager is aware as well, so that they are helping foster and encourage, and even maybe having a dialogue post the training with that individual who's a ne
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: How do you solicit feedback from employees about the culture and their engagement (e.g., engagement or other surveys, town halls, ?)
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Yeah, no, I think it's very much a two-way conversation always within Waymo in terms of how we engage with folks. And so, yes, one mechanism is, we have an employee engagement survey, which we run two times a year, and it's really that opportunity to get feedback from employees about how things are going. And we take it really seriously. I think when you do a survey, people expect to hear back. So what are you doing? What are the actions you take? And I'm proud as a company that we make it such a serious mechanism for how we get work done and how we make things better. I think second, the other piece of it is, we have employee gatherings on a regular basis, and we are never shy about getting feedback. We always solicit feedback. There's a survey after every employee gathering. Well, what do you suggest? And folks are not shy. They are very direct with us about their feedback, and leadership sees those regularly, and they act very fast. We get them out and they come back. And I think for that, you know, then you also have a lot of teams who are doing sub-team meetings as well, like my team this week. And again, it's continually getting feedback. Many times, there'll be what we call a dory. A dory is just like our internal tool, where folks can post questions. So it's always, it's like the expectation kind of goes back to the two-way communication in the company is that folks will have a voice, that they can raise their question, and that could be scary for many leaders. You don't know what question could get posed, but I think the more frequent it becomes, part of the day-to-day operating mechanism, which is what is expected here and what we do, then that just becomes how you work. And so for us, it's like, what is that question? People can bring it. And there's feedback a lot of times in the question. It'll be a question with feedback. So I think those are a few of the mechanisms by which we collect, and we act on it, just kind of every day.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, again, you're so casual about it, like it's just, it's like the air, you know, like the feedback is there.
What book would you recommend that your colleagues read? (or podcast, video, etc.)
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Okay, it's not going to be as big and bold, but it's going to be essential. And it's going to be, "Guess How Much I Love You." "Guess How Much I Love You," which is a children's book, and readers or listeners might not be familiar with that. But it's just kind of a basis for, you know, it's inclusion. It's how you know, it's making people feel safe. It's feeling loved. But I think in the workplace, it's like knowing that people are going to show up for one another, and people care about one another. And I think that's kind of the basis. It's that human to human connection which we know in the world in which we operate is so important. And so I think it's just kind of getting to the basics of knowing that an individual feels included and a person feels safe. That they can bring their authentic self to work, that there's a sense of assume good intent within the culture, and that again, it goes also to psychological safety, which we do talk a lot about internally, that people feel like I can discuss a topic, and I will be okay, and that I can take risks. And so I think this is kind of again, it's just more of a children's story, but I think it really shows the value of a person. And so I think that's kind of why, I think it's fun.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: And you mentioned one of my favorite pieces of wisdom, that if people really do this, it can change their lives. Assume positive intent, right? I mean, how many times do we react to an interaction with somebody? And we assume they're a jerk or they don't like us, or they're mean, or they're selfish or whatever. But if we would just assume positive intent, we don't know what's going on in their world. Most people don't show up at work and try to mess things up for everybody else; the world would be a better place, wouldn't it?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: That's exactly what I say all the time, Kevin. It's so true.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Assume positive intent. So, what is something that you know now that maybe you wish you knew when you first became a Chief People Officer? Imagine if you could send yourself a Slack message back in time, what? What would be some advice?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Just always know the big and significant and bold impact you have on people's lives every day. And I think through a pandemic, navigating a pandemic, that's been so true when I think about the impact that this role has on shaping the experience of all the individuals in the company. And so first, when you think about the pandemic, it's knowing how this role was critical and essential to normalizing lives, of how people just show up for their families and then even for work, but at the same time keeping the company going. I think another one is just that time goes so fast, and the news cycles go so fast. And what I mean by that, also when you think about just kind of going back into the pandemic, it was we had to pivot so quickly as a company. New information was coming out all the time, be it from the CDC, or from whatever the source may be, and you know, safety is the foundation for us as a company. So, what are we doing to ensure the folks have the safest experience? They feel safe, psychologically safe, physically safe, that they also have equity in their work because we know some folks, they're in the cars, they're in an operations job, they're in a hardware lab. There's others who are software engineers. It's a little easier for them to work at home, but really thinking about equity in terms of the experience. And then I think also, just really thinking about, lastly, it's just like, how are you showing up and helping people so that they can get everything that they can do in a thoughtful way? And so it's just being thoughtful at every step. You have to go fast, but you also have to be thoughtful if you think about how we had to reshape the way work was done, especially in the early days. So I think kind of taking it from the top, it's knowing you're not always gonna have information. You're gonna have to go quickly. But bringing all the information that you have to bear. So that's in this role, you are a connector. You have a huge impact because you have a connection to the entire company in ways that many others don't. And so it's using that chair and using it wisely.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Love it. We're doing this chat at the end of October, so we're almost at the end of the year 2023. What do you plan to focus on for your team, you know, like, what are you guys going to be working on in the year ahead?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: So, you know, for us, I think it's a lot when I think of us, meaning my team, the people's team, about streamlining. I think we built so many great, you know, foundational efforts for the company over time, and so I think you always have to look and review them. And so are we being as effective as we can be? Are we getting everything out of that investment that we're making in all of our people's efforts? And when I say investment, something like performance management, you know, for example, are you getting? Is it the right amount of time spent for what you're getting out of it? I call it the ROI. And I think of it, you know, I'm a continuous improvement person. So I think about it like you have the Golden Gate Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge, they're painting that Golden Gate bridge all the time. They're going from one side to the next, and I think for my team this year in particular, coming into '24, it's about how we reevaluate some of the different efforts and ensure it's the highest and best use of everyone's time. And I say that because of the friction or the thing that we're going into, we have this bold technology to bring to the world. And the faster that we can bring that technology the better. So the faster that we can hit some of those goals that we need to achieve, the sooner we'll be able to bring it to the world, and the sooner we can save more lives. So I think that's always the trade-off. So it's just being mindful, getting feedback, and then streamlining.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: What excites you the most about your company right now?
Becky Bucich - Waymo: You know, I think for me it's about lifting up our mission, you know, and bringing it to the world. You know, safety is our foundation, and I know I've talked about that. But as we think about Waymo One, and where we are, it's being able to thoughtfully scale and take that. And we are right at the precipice. And when I say that, we started in Phoenix, and we've been in a commercial service for Phoenix for a while. But then now we are the first and only company to offer that fully autonomous technology of the ride, 24/7 to members of the public in San Francisco, which is freaking amazing. And so I think for us, we're steadily building it to be in multiple geographic areas. So from Phoenix to San Francisco, we launched a tour in LA. And so we're inviting residents and visitors to come out and experience the Waymo driver. And now Austin will be our next market. And so I think about for me, what excites me, what gets me out of bed every day is the impact that we're having on thousands of individuals in their daily lives. If I think about my own parents who are aging and will now soon not be able to be able to drive, but are so independent, it's being able to, you know, not lose that independence. When I think about even just a friend of my son who doesn't have the best vision and is more visually impaired, he isn't going to feel safe driving. But knowing that he can still feel very safe because he can also be independent and take a Waymo ride, for example, and not have to worry about the driving record of the individual who's behind the wheel, either. So I think these are a few of the use cases out there, and I think that just, it brings a lot of joy to me to think about those who are out there, people with epilepsy, like you know, who can't independently go about their day-to-day world. And so I think about the world that we will be able to have such an impact that individuals can go about their day-to-day lives in an unencumbered way. It's pretty amazing. And so I think that's what drives me and excites me about where we are and that we're gonna do it in a very thoughtful way. That can make our riders feel very safe.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Thank you for the work that you're doing. Thank you for that mission, Chief People Officer at Waymo, Becky Bucich. Thanks for coming on the program.
Becky Bucich - Waymo: Thank you so much, Kevin.