My mantra for 2021: stay nimble, stay humble, stay growing

As we close out an historic year and move into a new one, now is the time to transform how we show up with agility, solve problems by asking the unexpected questions, and lead with empathy. These ambitions were extremely evident at the recent Accelerate21, Google Cloud’s annual GTM kickoff conference, where Googlers and partners from across the world rallied around an itinerary to solve for the future, packed with innovative ideas that can be implemented right away. Here is what I see as critical on our journey for our future to be successful:

Agility will continue to fuel our momentum.

I am incredibly impressed with how nimble Google Cloud has been over the past year. None of us could have predicted how 2020 unfolded, and yet we didn’t let the pandemic or the state of the world define us—instead, we rose up and met the moment with agility. As a result, we experienced momentum across regions, industries, and solutions, inspiring new customers to join us and expanding our existing customer partnerships. We closed our biggest deals ever and helped many through major transformations.

In EMEA, we have accelerated traction in Financial Services and Telco, and are helping customers like Deutsche Bank, Lloyds, HSBC, Telecom Italia, and Telefonica. North America is seeing great successes in Retail and SAP workloads, with The Home Depot, Procter & Gamble, and Lowe’s. In APAC, we are doing great work with digital natives like Sharechat and Tokopedia, and there is strong momentum with Workspace and Gaming in Japan, specifically Hanamaruki Foods, Aquaplus, and Nintendo. And LATAM is heating up with digital transformation partnerships, such as Boa Vista.

In the Public Sector, we have sizable partnerships with the U.S. Air Force, the Defense Innovation Unit, the U.S. Department of Energy, and the Australian Government Department of Health. And across the world, small- and medium-sized businesses are driving volume at speed, representing an impressive 1.4 million new customers in 2020!

We should feel proud of helping these customers solve for 2020, and we need to bring that energy into 2021 to help them solve for the future. As we do, continuing to think big and not shying away from complex challenges, as well as diversifying our portfolio and approaches based on needs, will make all the difference—for our customers and our business.

2021 will be all about growth.

Without question, the pandemic has ushered in a digital revolution. With new ways of working, enormous change happening in areas like supply chains, and a desire to plan for recovery and post-pandemic success, companies are trying to reimagine their own futures. Google Cloud is meeting the moment by deploying lots of modern technology to help them do just that. As a result we are arguably the fastest growing cloud. At Accelerate21, we focused on how to build upon this hyper-growth. The answer? Keep our company focused on meeting our customers where they are and providing new capabilities they couldn’t access before. Being a true partner and having the conversations of tomorrow will unlock meaningful, sustainable growth.

Customer empathy will be the key to, well, everything.

At Google Cloud, we believe that underpinning our success and that of our customers is celebrating and investing time in people, not just products. Customer empathy is the guiding principle of our company culture, which is always and necessarily evolving and backed by a strong growth mindset. That means everything we do comes from true listening and understanding so that we can help clients achieve their specific outcomes. 

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) is an important part of our culture of empathy, and sessions on DEI and wellness were a core part of the experience at Accelerate21. One key takeaway from those sessions is that accounting for differences is essential: for instance, the approach taken in North America cannot be universally applied to all of the world’s regions. Rather, we must respect the nuances of all of the regions that we work in and flex to their functional working norms. 

Google Cloud had a banner year in 2020 in spite of all of its challenges. By moving fast, respecting the customer, providing best-in-class solutions, and innovating and delivering what is most helpful, Google Cloud and our valued partners are on track to more of the same in 2021—modernizing for the present while solving for and defining the future. Personally, this energizes, motivates and excites me to get out of bed every morning and look forward to solving for the future!