Google started as the project of graduate students at Stanford, but as it became successful and grew they realized they needed some managerial assistance, and this book comes from two of the people they brought in: Eric Schmidt (Executive Chairman) and Jonathan Rosenberg (SVP of Products). As one of the most successful companies in the world (perennially in the top three for market capitalization) knowing how they did that is worth some consideration. And this is an interesting book for that. Their story is that they were brought in to apply management skills but quickly learned that Google could not be managed the way they were used to doing it. They focus on empowering creative people to do awesome things, and there is certainly evidence that Google does that, but it is also true that this is an insider's book that is not going to air any dirty laundry. So take it with a grain of salt.