Google CEO Sundar Pichai shares mantra to cope with pressure at work: 'I learned it as a student'

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and Google, whose role heavily involves navigating high-stakes decisions and intractable problems, has revealed a simple two-part mantra he relies on to cope with work-related stress. Pichai, speaking at a Stanford Business School event in April 2022, stated he learned this philosophy during his graduate studies.

His coping mechanism is straightforward: first, making any decision is superior to wasting time endlessly mulling over options. Second, most choices are not permanent, and mistakes offer opportunities for learning. Pichai explained that when his Google teams present him with a dilemma, often divided between two solutions, he pushes himself to choose one efficiently. The alternative, he noted, is succumbing to pressure, which can slow down not just the team but the entire $1.92 trillion company.

“You making that decision is the most important thing you can do [to move forward],” Pichai stated at the event. He added, “It may feel like a lot rides on [your choice], but you look later, and realise, it wasn’t that consequential.”

Pichai credits his mentor Bill Campbell – a former Intuit CEO and Apple board director – for teaching him how to help teams solve problems swiftly. While studying material science and engineering at Stanford University, Pichai learned from Campbell, who also coached tech luminaries like Steve Jobs and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, the importance of being an effective tiebreaker for a deadlocked team. “Every week [Campbell] would see me, he would ask me, ‘What ties did you break this week?’" Pichai recalled, noting it taught him to be comfortable with the final word. “It’s always stuck with me.”