Laszlo Bock Laszlo Bock is an influencer

2x start-up founder --​> 2 exits | x-Google SVP of People Operations | NYT bestselling author of “Work Rules!” | Founder/Faculty at Berkeley | Board at Stanford | Advisor/investor

San Francisco Bay Area
1M followers 500+ connections

About

Laszlo is a Senior Advisor at Anthropic, the founder and Co-Director of the Berkeley Transformative CHRO Leadership Academy and a member of the Board of the Stanford Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences. He founded, scaled and sold two companies (most recently to NVIDIA). Before that, he spent a decade as a member of the Executive Management Team at Google where he served as Senior Vice President of People Operations. His best-selling book, Work Rules!, has sold more than 750,000 copies with 100% of his book income donated to charity. He is an active investor and advisor in startups, with 60% of his portfolio companies going on to become unicorns and 85% having become unicorns or been acquired. Finally, he is also a documentary film and Broadway musical producer, with four Tony Award-nominated or -winning productions.

Laszlo was the founder and Chairman of Gretel.ai, the leader in synthetic data for AI (acquired by NVIDIA in 2025). He was also the founder, Chairman, and CEO of Humu, which used “nudges” to make people happier and more productive at work (acquired by Perceptyx in 2023). He has raised more than $150 million in venture capital funding.

From 2006 to 2016, Laszlo was the Senior Vice President of People Operations of Google/Alphabet, and a member of the executive management team. He grew the company from 6,000 to 75,000 employees while ensuring the culture remained innovative and robust. Laszlo co-led the creation of the field of “People Analytics”, the application of academic-quality rigor and Google-paced innovation to people management. He also co-led the development of the Google Job Search API, the only element of Google’s search engine developed outside of Google’s engineering organization. During his tenure, Google was named the #1 Best Company to Work for in the United States seven times as well as recognized over 150 times around the world as an exceptional employer. He was named “HR Executive of the Year”, “HR Executive of the Decade”, and elected to the National Academy of Human Resources. More than 150 of his team members have since become CHROs.

He is a sought-after speaker on workforce topics, AI, leadership and company-building. He has appeared on CNN, the Today Show, Good Morning America, NPR and the BBC; testified before Congress; and been quoted in and written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and Businessweek. He has worked with multiple Presidential Transition Teams and has been called on by various Administrations to provide counsel on workforce-related topics.

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Experience

  • Stanford, Center For Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences Graphic

    Board Member

    Stanford, Center For Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences

    - Present 1 year 5 months

  • University of California, Berkeley Graphic

    Co-Founder and Co-Faculty Director of the Berkeley Transformative CHRO Academy

    University of California, Berkeley

    - Present 1 year 10 months

    Berkeley, California, United States

  • Investor, Coach and Producer

    n/a

    - Present 9 years 2 months

    TECHNOLOGY INVESTING/ADVISING
    60% unicorn rate and 85% unicorn/exited rate across all investments.

    THEATER AND FILM INVESTING/PRODUCING
    Tony Award winner/nominated: & Juliet, Almost Famous (Exec Producer), Days of Wine and Roses (Exec Producer), Sister Act, The Notebook (Exec Producer)
    Documentary films: Folktales, Gaucho Gaucho (Exec Producer - Sundance Award winner), Move Ya Body: The Birth of House, and Rapinoe (Exec Producer)

  • Hachette Book Group Graphic

    Author, WORK RULES!

    Hachette Book Group

    - Present 11 years 2 months

    Required textbook at Stanford, Harvard, Berkeley, Wharton, USC, Berklee College of Music and other universities. 100% of book income donated to charity.

    "A bold, inspiring, and actionable vision that will transform the future of work. It should be mandatory reading for everyone who leads, manages, or has a job."―Adam Grant

    "A dazzling revelation: at once an all-access backstage pass to one of the smartest organizations on the planet, and also an immensely useful blueprint for…

    Required textbook at Stanford, Harvard, Berkeley, Wharton, USC, Berklee College of Music and other universities. 100% of book income donated to charity.

    "A bold, inspiring, and actionable vision that will transform the future of work. It should be mandatory reading for everyone who leads, manages, or has a job."―Adam Grant

    "A dazzling revelation: at once an all-access backstage pass to one of the smartest organizations on the planet, and also an immensely useful blueprint for creating a culture of creativity."―Dan Coyle, author of The Talent Code

    "A remarkable book that reveals the secrets of becoming a talent powerhouse. He shows the many benefits of a high freedom culture with a mission that matters."―Dan Pink, author of Drive and To Sell Is Human

  • General Catalyst Graphic

    Senior Advisor

    General Catalyst

    - 2 years 1 month

  • Gretel Inc Graphic

    Co-Founder and Board Chair

    Gretel Inc

    - 5 years 8 months

    Acquired by NVIDIA in 2025. The synthetic data platform purpose-built for AI.

  • Humu Graphic

    Co-Founder, CEO and Board Chair

    Humu

    - 6 years 3 months

    Acquired by Perceptyx in 2023. Making work better for everyone, everywhere through science, machine learning, and a little bit of love.

  • Heidrick & Struggles Graphic

    Board Member and Chair, HR and Compensation Committee

    Heidrick & Struggles

    - 2 years 2 months

  • Generation Investment Management Graphic

    Advisory Board Member

    Generation Investment Management

    - 4 years

    Greater London, England, United Kingdom

    Co-founded by Vice President Al Gore, our vision is a sustainable world in which prosperity is shared broadly, in a society that achieves wellbeing for all, protects nature and preserves a habitable climate.

  • Google Graphic

    SVP, People Operations (CHRO) / Executive Committee Member

    Google

    - 10 years 10 months

    First head of People Operations for Google/Alphabet. 3 CEOs. 15x revenue growth. 12x headcount growth. >200 acquisitions. 150+ POps alumni who have since become CHROs. Google Job Search. People Analytics. Project Oxygen. Project Aristotle. Project Cerebro. DEI. Re:Work. 3M applicants per year. LGBTQ global benefits. Death benefits. Many, many centi-threads.

  • GE Graphic

    VP, Human Resources

    GE

    - 3 years

  • McKinsey & Company Graphic

    Management Consultant

    McKinsey & Company

    - 4 years

Education

Volunteer Experience

Skills

Publications

  • Excerpt from WORK RULES!

    Wired Magazine

    Excerpt from my book entitled "Here's Google's Secret to Hiring the Best People"

    See publication
  • WORK RULES! Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead

    Twelve Books, a division of Hachette Book Group

    Publication date: April 7, 2015 Available for pre-order now (http://amzn.to/1z6DljS). Named one of the top 15 upcoming business books of 2015 (http://read.bi/1ykl5mS).

    "We spend more time working than doing anything else in life. It's not right that the experience of work should be so demotivating and dehumanizing." So says Laszlo Bock, head of People Operations at the company that transformed how the world interacts with knowledge. This insight is the heart of WORK RULES!, a compelling…

    Publication date: April 7, 2015 Available for pre-order now (http://amzn.to/1z6DljS). Named one of the top 15 upcoming business books of 2015 (http://read.bi/1ykl5mS).

    "We spend more time working than doing anything else in life. It's not right that the experience of work should be so demotivating and dehumanizing." So says Laszlo Bock, head of People Operations at the company that transformed how the world interacts with knowledge. This insight is the heart of WORK RULES!, a compelling and surprisingly playful manifesto with the potential to change how we work and live.

    Drawing on the latest research in behavioral economics and with a profound grasp of human psychology, Bock also provides teaching examples from a range of industries — including companies that are household names but hideous places to work, and little-known companies that achieve spectacular results by valuing and listening to their employees. Bock takes us inside one of history's most explosively successful businesses to reveal why Google is consistently rated one of the best places to work in the world, distilling 15 years of intensive worker R&D into delightfully counterintuitive principles that are easy to put into action, whether you're a team of one or a team of thousands.

    Lessons from WORK RULES! include:

    * Take away managers' power over employees
    * Only hire people who are smarter than you are, no matter how long it takes to find them
    * Pay unfairly (it's more fair!)
    * Don't trust your gut: use data to predict and shape the future
    * Default to open: be transparent, and welcome feedback
    * If you're comfortable with the amount of freedom you've given your employees, you haven't gone far enough

    WORK RULES! shows how to strike a balance between creativity and structure, leading to success you can measure in quality of life as well as market share. Read it to build a better company from within rather than from above; read it to reawaken your joy in what you do.

    See publication
  • Excerpt from WORK RULES!

    Fortune Magazine

    Excerpt from my book entitled "Google’s 10 things to transform your team and your workplace." This issue of Fortune also announces Google as the "#1 Best Company to Work for" for the 6th time.

    See publication

Honors & Awards

  • Top 100 HR Influencers

    HR Executive Magazine

    http://hrexecutive.com/top-100/

  • Best Leadership Books of All Time

    BookAuthority.org

    https://bookauthority.org/books/best-leadership-books?t=46ri8q&s=author&book=1455554790

  • Entrepreneur's 9 Must Read Books

    Entrepreneur.com

    http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/271992

  • #1 Best Translated Book in Japan

    Japanese Editors and Translators

  • 20 Best Business Books of the Year

    Business Insider, UK

    http://uk.businessinsider.com/the-best-business-books-of-2015-2015-12?sf17803043=1%3Fr%3DUS&IR=T

  • Best Books of 2015

    Inc. Magazine

    http://www.inc.com/jeff-haden/the-100-best-business-books-of-2015.html

  • Best Business Books of the Year - 2015

    Matthew Bishop, Senior Editor of The Economist Group

    https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/best-business-books-2015-matthew-bishop

  • Book of the Year

    The Globe and Mail

    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/careers/management/top-10-leadership-and-management-books-of-2015/article27767344/

  • Top 10 Creative Leadership Books of 2015

    Forbes

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/berlinschoolofcreativeleadership/2015/12/11/top-10-creative-leadership-books-of-2015/

  • Top 10 Business Books of the Year

    Amazon.com

    http://www.amazon.com/b/ref=s9_acss_bw_cg_boty15_2d

  • Top 50 Leadership Innovators

    Inc.

    http://www.inc.com/shawn-murphy/today-s-top-50-leadership-innovators-changing-how-we-lead.html

  • 5 Books Your Boss Wishes You Would Read

    SimplyHired

    http://blog.simplyhired.com/jobsearch/career/books-improve-your-career/

  • 10 Trechos Dos Melhores Livros de Negocios de 2015

    Epoca Negocios

    10 Passages from the Best Business Books of 2015 (Portuguese)

    http://epocanegocios.globo.com/Inspiracao/Carreira/noticia/2015/03/10-trechos-dos-melhores-livros-de-negocios-de-2015.html

  • 17 Livres pour Penser la Transformation Numérique du Travail

    L'Usine Digital

    17 Books for Thinking about the Digital Transformation of Work (French)

    http://www.usine-digitale.fr/editorial/17-livres-et-autres-medias-pour-penser-la-transformation-numerique-du-travail.N321548

  • Amazon Editors' Pick of the Month

    Amazon.com

    Best Business & Leadership Book

    http://www.amazon.com/Best-Books-of-the-Month/b/ref=sv_b_8?ie=UTF8&node=390919011

  • New York Times Bestseller

    New York Times

    http://www.nytimes.com/best-sellers-books/advice-how-to-and-miscellaneous/list.html

  • Publishers Weekly Bestseller

    Publishers Weekly

    #7 Bestselling Hardcover Nonfiction
    http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/nielsen/HardcoverNonfiction.html

  • Wall Street Journal Bestseller

    Wall Street Journal

    #3 Bestelling Hardcover Business Book

    #9 Bestselling Overall Hardcover Book

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/best-selling-books-week-ended-april-12-1429211261

  • Best Business Books of 2015

    Inc.

    http://www.inc.com/john-brandon/10-quotes-from-the-best-business-books-of-2015-so-far.html

  • HR Professional of the Decade

    ERE.net

    http://www.ere.net/2015/03/30/revealing-the-hr-professional-of-the-decade-laszlo-bock-of-google/

  • 26 Books Every Recruiter Should Read

    Entelo

    http://blog.entelo.com/26-books-every-recruiter-should-read

  • New Books for Creative Leaders to Read to Start 2015

    Berlin School of Creative Leadership

    http://www.berlin-school.com/news-media/blogs/blogentry/new-books-for-creative-leaders-to-read-to-start-2015/

    The much-anticipated exploration of new ways of thinking about and behaving at work from the longtime head of Google’s ‘People Operations.’ The result is a manifesto on how to approach work differently in order to attract and grow the best talent – and, in the process for leaders, to grow themselves.

  • 10 New Books We'll Be Reading this Year

    Fast Company

    http://www.fastcompany.com/3040972/10-new-books-well-be-reading-this-year

    "[U]nconventional and counterintuitive lessons such as taking away managers’ power over employees, why you should pay unfairly, and going beyond your comfort zone when it comes to the freedom you give your team. ' ... It’s not right that the experience of work should be so demotivating and dehumanizing,' Bock says. Right on."

  • 6 Books that Could Benefit Your Business in 2015

    BT Business

    http://www.insight.bt.com/en/features/2015-book-recommendations

    "WORK RULES! isn’t the first book to shine a light on Google’s hugely successful corporate culture, but it’s the first in-depth look from right inside the company. Indeed, it’s straight from the horse’s mouth: Laszlo Bock is head of Google's people operations .... Why read it? Because it pays to make your company a place that people want to work."

  • Editor's Pick: Top Business Books to Read in 2015

    The Telegraph

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/businessclub/11344474/Top-business-books-to-read-in-2015.html

    "Google says it receives 1.5m job applications a year. Here, the tech giant's head of 'People Operations' explains why. Laszlo Bock reveals Google's HR secrets to creating a happy workforce and attracting the world's brightest candidates."

  • Publisher's Weekly Top 10: Business & Economics

    Publisher's Weekly

    http://publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/new-titles/adult-announcements/article/65381-spring-2015-announcements-business-economics-turning-the-corner.html

    "Anecdotes about Google’s founding and history mingle with discussions of management theory, psychology, and behavioral economics to create a fascinating and accessible read."

  • The 15 New Books to Read in 2015

    Huffington Post

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adam-grant/the-15-new-books-to-read_b_6428688.html

    "It's a captivating, data-driven book on achieving sustainable productivity, remarkable innovation, and a genuine sense of community--and an inspiring, actionable vision for transforming the future of work."

  • Top Business Books to Read in 2015

    Life of an Entrepreneur

    https://entrepreneurseries.wordpress.com/tag/work-rules-laszlo-bock/

    "Imagine being the HR manager for one of the best companies to work for in the world? How much pressure would you have...? .... Then after that you have to learn how to create an environment that encourages people to grow and increase productivity, all of which can be challenge, but brought together in this richly packed book of data examples."

  • 15 of the Best Business Books Coming Out in 2015

    Business Insider

    http://www.businessinsider.com/best-business-books-of-2015-2014-12#work-rules-insights-from-inside-google-that-will-transform-how-you-live-and-lead-11

    "Google has developed a sterling reputation as one of the best places in the world to work, and a good deal of that is due to the efforts of Laszlo Bock, the company's head of People Operations, which is essentially human resources. With the help of recent studies in behavioral economics and psychology, he breaks down the management and…

    http://www.businessinsider.com/best-business-books-of-2015-2014-12#work-rules-insights-from-inside-google-that-will-transform-how-you-live-and-lead-11

    "Google has developed a sterling reputation as one of the best places in the world to work, and a good deal of that is due to the efforts of Laszlo Bock, the company's head of People Operations, which is essentially human resources. With the help of recent studies in behavioral economics and psychology, he breaks down the management and office culture principles that make Google a powerful company with happy employees."

  • Editor's Pick: 12 Leadership Books to Watch for in 2015

    The Washington Post

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-leadership/wp/2014/12/04/wp/2014/22/04/12-leadership-books-to-watch-for-in-2015/

    "Bock runs a department that’s been described as 'more like a rigorous science lab than the pesky hall monitor most of us picture when we think of H.R.' Bock’s new book examines what he has learned managing H.R. at one of the most generous — and also most data-driven — companies for workers, as well as what is and isn't successful at other places."

  • Library Journal Preview

    Library Journal

    http://reviews.libraryjournal.com/2014/10/prepub/nonfiction-previews/business-science-social-science-nonfiction-previews-apr-2015-pt-4/

    "Billed as LEAN IN for every manager, this is good guidance from the head of Google’s innovative People Operations, who wants to show companies how to attract and keep the best managers. His tips might unsettle .... Love the read-it-two-ways title; with a 200,000-copy first printing."

  • Inaugural Donaldson Fellow

    Yale University School of Management

    https://som.yale.edu/the-som-experience/mission/donaldson-fellows

  • 10 Most Influential HR Practitioners

    https://www.smartrecruiters.com/blog/the-10-most-influential-hr-practitioners/

  • Fellow, National Academy of Human Resources

    http://www.nationalacademyhr.org/fellowsdirectory

  • HR Executive of the Year

    http://www.hreonline.com/HRE/view/story.jhtml?id=533322196

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