Yesterday the Google Earth team launched a holiday add-on  for Google Earth that turns the entire globe into a hide-and-go-seek playground for hidden toys from Santa.  Later in the day, the Google Video blog posted a link  to a funny video of a dog in a Santa suit and antlers.  You may be wondering what any of that has to do with the purpose of this blog.  It's actually quite simple:  it's an excellent example of inter-departmental cooperation.

When was the last time you launched something and another department jumped in to help you promote it?

I think cooperation like this is one of the things that sets Google apart from other companies.  I think it's part of the reason they've been so successful as a company.  If you read the Google blogs you know that it's quite common for one department to launch a product or upgrade and have the public support and promotion of that product from at least one other department.  In fact, it's not uncommon for one team of Google developers to sing the praises of another company product out of the blue… just for the sake of hyping the other team's work.

Now that's cooperation.

Of course it's not uncommon for some departments to work together:  sales & finance, technology & research/development.  But what I'm talking about here is complete organizational support.  Would it be strange for your sales department to congratulate your research/development department on designing a new interface for a completely non-sales related piece of company software?  Would the accounting department think a mistake had been made if they received praise from the marketing department for getting the quarterly reports done a week in advance?

At most companies, the answers to both of those questions would be yes.  But Google shows us that not only should it not be strange, but also that it can actually benefit your company's productivity.  Imagine the increase in motivation if each department wasn't just working on projects for the department… but for the entire company.  As companies get bigger, individual departments have a tendency to separate into semi-autonomous, disconnected groups.  Independent groups don't always work well together, especially when each one has it's own agenda, goals, and concerns.

It's time to bring those groups back together.  What can you do to make your company or organization operate as a more cohesive unit?  What can you do to help your accounting department care about what the media department is doing?  It's time for a little internal marketing.  But instead of marketing your product or service to consumers you'll be marketing the entire company to each department.