August 5, 2007

Inside the world of Google The Dalles

By RODGER NICHOLS
of The Chronicle

     Google — the invisible giant in The Dalles — now has a human face. After two years of issuing carefully-controlled snippets of information about the local plant, the company is moving towards a policy of engaging more with the community.
     As part of that policy, the company has encouraged plant manager Ken Patchett to become both more visible and more involved locally.
     To that end, Patchett invited Chronicle Managing Editor Kathy Gray and me to join him for lunch at the Google campus. On July 19, we became the first members of the media to set foot in the Google compound in The Dalles.
     Though we were both given badges and required to sign nondisclosure agreements, they were the kinder, gentler sort of NDA, that only protects “confidential information,” and allows us to describe what we saw. They were headed “Mutual Non-Disclosure Agreement,” thus preventing Google, in turn, from disclosing any confidential information about The Dalles Chronicle we may have let slip.
     We were even allowed to bring a camera, and take pictures in certain areas.
     What’s it like at Google?
     Very nice, indeed, and the Googlers have a sense of humor. One of the first things we saw, attached to the fence by the security building, was a sign containing the word “Voldemort.” It’s a sly reference to Google’s own initial local secrecy, since throughout the Harry Potter series, Voldemort is referred to as      “He Who Must Not Be Named.”
     Though we saw only some open areas and the interiors of the security building and the cafeteria building, they were quietly comfortable without posh ostentation. Facilities are what you might expect might be provided by a kindly uncle with a soft spot for good food and employee comfort.
     Other companies might do as Google did recently, and take a hundred employees to a private showing of the new Transfomer movie, or provide an outdoor basketball court. But they likely wouldn’t allow impromptu pickup games during working hours, or provide a company game room with a big screen high-definition television and “every video game you can think of,” as Patchett put it.
Nor would they supply a pile of Super Soakers just outside the cafeteria, in case a squirt gun fight was required by hot weather.
     Google employees also eat very well, it seems. The day we were there the buffet line included barbecued pork, steak strips and teriyaki chicken, as well as assorted vegetables, salads and desserts. The kitchen area also sported supermarket-style glass-doored coolers for a wide variety of soft drinks, from Red Bull to flavored teas to standard pop varieties, all on a help-yourself basis.
     Over lunch, Patchett shared some of the details of his personal life. Raised in Germany, he’s lived in a number of towns in the U.S. and traveled all over the world. Google recruited him from Microsoft, and he jumped at the chance to manage the plant in The Dalles because he was familiar with the town. He once worked for a company that dealt with Mountain Fir Lumber Company, whose former site is visible from the current Google plant.
     “When the chipper broke, I would come in and fix it,” he said.
     Patchett said the move was a good one for him and his family, including his four sons.
     “I have access to the sporting and the fishing and the mountain-climbing and everything that I want to do and I still get to play with the technology,” he said.
     “This is the place to be. Look, it’s the end of the Oregon Trail, and it’s the beginning of the new wave of technology. We’re right here. You want to go to Portland to a great opera and show? Great, it’s an hour down the road. You want to go to the beach? to the river? to the mountains? You can be anywhere, any environment, within a little time from here.”
     Patchett said Google’s initial secrecy had been adjusted due to the company’s experience here. “Our challenge was understanding that transparency was important. We’ve learned an awful lot about being open with with community early on. And don’t just focus on what you have to do to build [the plant]; focus on being a solid member of the community.”
     He also responded to concerns from some parts of the community about the size of Google’s 15-year tax break, only the second of that length ever to be offered by Oregon.
     Benchmarks to qualify for the incentive require the company to offer average wages 150 percent of the county’s previous average wage, invest specific amounts of capital and employ certain numbers of people. Those numbers vary with the size of the investment.
     “You know that we’re meeting those goals,” Patchett said. “The important thing to realize, is, even with the incentive, the good business sense it takes to come here, Google has added an awful lot of value into the community.”
     He said one of the contractors working on Google spent more than $500,000 on lunches and dinners for its employees locally last year. “And that’s just one of the companies we’re working with,” he added.
     Patchett addressed an area of puzzlement for some local people: Google’s unwillingness to divulge the number of employees in The Dalles. “How would that give Google’s competitors an advantage?” we asked him.
     “It’s an extremely competitive industry we’re in,” he said. “The ability to determine how some things are done within the Internet space may also be determined by the number of people it takes to operate a particular facility. So when we talk about how much capacity we have to process the information, that is what’s valuable to our competitors; how fast and how well do we process our information. Some piece of that may able to be derived by the number of people it takes to actually run and support that.”
     But he did say the operation in The Dalles was nearing 200 people “for the total package.”
     Patchett also noted Google offered people, who otherwise would not have had an opportunity, to find work with Google, leverage their knowledge and grow into other areas, not only within Google, but in the world.
     He cited Camden Lindsay, former IT expert for Orchardview Farms.
     “The Baileys gave me a bunch of grief for taking him. But it was happy for them, because now Camden is in a place where not only is he doing well, but he is doing exceedingly well. We have several other stories like that of local guys who have come in here and really kicked butt. And it’s not surprising to us.      Because we know that people that work with computers and the Internet space — they’re all over the place.”
     Patchett said Google’s community is really concentrating on its outreach program. Repeatedly, Patchett emphasized that, to Google, community outreach means resources more than money, and he outlined a number of areas in which the company is working:
     One such included the stage in City Park. Musical acts and theater productions were powered by an extension cord run nearly the length of the park. It was inconvenient, and a tripping hazard.
     “We sent out one of our contractors;” Patchett said. “They dug the trenches, put in the [electrical] boxes, hooked them up. We think that’s the kind of benefit the company should provide. It’s resources over dollars; it’s our people being here.”
     Patchett himself volunteered to sit in a dunk tank at a recent company picnic, offering employees three chances for a dollar to dunk the boss. That stunt raised $140, which he donated to the Wasco County Animal Shelter, next door to the Google plant. He also invited kennel workers over for Google for lunch.
     The company also finds ways to put its expertise to use on behalf of the community, he said. They have set aside special e-mail addresses for use of Wasco Rural Fire Department and The Dalles Wasco County Library.
     Neither organization has an IT department, Patchett said, so when an e-mail is sent to those addresses, it goes to Google volunteers who help restore Internet connections or solve other computer-related problems.
     Google volunteers also “weed the shelves” at the library every couple of weeks he said.
     What’s next?
     Look for Google’s own local community outreach vehicle, a “working, fully functional ambulance with a couple of computers in it,” as Patchett describes it, that will be called Northwest Computer Services.
     “That is what we’re going to use the next time we drive to the fire station or the library to work on their computers,” he said. “We’ll use it in the Cherry Festival Parade next year.”
     The company is also partnering with a number of local firms and agencies to explore the possibility of creating a new 9-1-1 comm center at the old fire station at Columbia View Heights.
     He said Google is helping to bring in some consultants on the project, but was not leading the charge.
     “There might be some things that we might seed at first, but we don’t want to be like a white knight; we’re just part of this group.”
     Patchett also commented that the project could be an example of putting technology in its place and putting it to the right use.
     “The first day a fire truck goes out there and saves kids — look, I’m getting all teared up — Man, that will be the day. That’s what we’re looking for.”
     Another major change:
     “We have now joined, for the first time that I know of — as Google — the Chamber of Commerce,” Patchett said. “That will be out in your next month’s [newsletter.]”
     He said Google plans to offer seminars on adwords through the chamber. Businesses who subscribe pick words related to their businesses that people using the Google search engine might use. A hair salon, for example, might pick “hair” as one of its adwords. A searcher using the word “hair” on Google might see an ad for the hair salon at the side of the search page. If the searcher clicks on the ad and goes to the salon’s home page, the salon pays for the click-through.
     Choosing the right strategy for adwords can result in more visitors to a business website.
     Patchett had a surprising offer for nonprofit organizations.
     “There’s a huge untapped resource in the not-for-profit world where adwords can help immensely and most not-for-profits aren’t aware of it.
     “Google can give up to $10,000 in free adwords specifically for non-for-profits, and specifically through the Chambers of Commerce in the areas that we live. It’s a huge untapped resource to support these organizations, and we are working on figuring out the right ways to reach out to these folks, to share with them how it can be done and how it can be used.”
     Told that the Chamber’s phone would likely ring off the hook, Patchett said that would be great.
     Personally, he added, “I’m thrilled to be here. I’m glad to be out of the city; I’m glad to be out of the two- and-a-half-hour commute each way. My kids are in a school where the teachers care about them and care enough to e-mail me and call me. To me, it’s just a great place for us to be.”