Google, a company known for implementing pioneering people management processes, is poised to appoint Eileen Naughton as the new head of it global people operations.  In an exclusive report, Fortune magazine confirmed that the current Vice President of Sales and Operations for Google in the UK and Ireland will be joining Google’s people management team as the VP of people operation.  Naughton, who is also a founding member of the Women@ initiative, will now report to Ruth Porat, the Chief Financial Officer of Google’s parent business Alphabet. In the ten years she has been at Google, Naughton had helped Google establish the commercial side of the business in the US and then eventually leading the business in the UK and Ireland. 

A great advocate of the digital space Eileen Naughton worked with Time magazine, where she was the President for a period of over three years, before joining Google in 2006. But her new role doesn’t come without challenges.  Her new role puts Naughton at the helm of managing all of the human resource management practices massive company. Being the global head she now has the responsibility of recruiting, managing and motivating a 64,000 employee strong company.  Of which recruiting forms a major portion as it is Google key day to day operations, with the company getting 2.5 million resumes per year. In the past year, Google has added 7,000 employees, up from 57,000 in July of 2015.

But the appointment of Eileen Naughton also brings with itself the news of Lazlo Bock, Google's long-time head of HR, is finally stepping down. Laszlo Bock, who's led human resources for the past ten years, will be staying on as an advisor to CEO Sundar Pichai, Fortune magazine reported. Having recently written a book titled "Work Rules!” Lazlo has been responsible for sowing the seeds of a robust company culture, fruits of which the companies enjoy today. Being responsible for setting the tone of people management with Google, Bock has been the point of lead for many company practices being set up that have made Google a truly unique place to work, one in which  encourages creativity, respects, and prizes its talent and  is a place where job perks are plentiful.  Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page attribute Google’s mammoth success and rapid rate of innovation to its nurturing working environment. The amount of clarity of vision and focus that Lazlo bought in for Google, across the past decade, has been immense. Being widely regarded as the best place to work in the world Google has continued to be one of the most favored employer across the globe. Having achieved the number one spot in Fortune’s ‘100 Best Companies to Work For’ list seven times in the last 10 years, it also featured in the top 5 of the LinkedIn list of ‘Top Talent Attractors’, globally. 

Having a strong legacy behind her, Eileen Naughton definitely has some big shoes to fill. One area that, within the larger ambit of peoples operation within Google, Naughton would get a chance to pay special attention to would be the diversity issue plaguing the technical companies in the US. Having founded the Google reach out program for women along with former Google exec and current Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Naughton now has the scope to expand such practices across the globe to push for better sustainable options to get diverse talent in the organization.  But irrespective of her focus, Naughton has a challenging and an exciting journey ahead.