July 12th 2019 was a valuable moment for Bachelor of Entrepreneurship class of 2021 students. The students got an opportunity to visit Google Indonesia in Jakarta. This program is a field trip managed by Entrepreneurship Study Program of School of Business and Management, Institut Teknologi Bandung (SBM-ITB). The main objective of the program is to learn and experience innovation on design thinking process and business digitalization in the 4.0 era. SBM ITB believes that those aims are related to Google performance in providing innovation for fulfilling their mission “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful”. Google Indonesia is a representative of Google LLC in the United States of America (USA). As an American multinational technology company, Google specializes in Internet-related services and products such as online advertising technologies, search engine, cloud computing, software, and hardware. Google Indonesia office is located at Pacific Century Place, 45th floor, Jalan Jenderal Soedirman, SCBD lot 10, Jakarta.
After 6-hour travel by bus from Bandung, SBM ITB students arrived at the Google office at 07.00 am. After administration check, the students were directed to a training room named Balai Kota to receive a brief about the workshop. The event started at 09.00 am, opened by SBM ITB lecturer, Mrs. Evy Rachmawati, M.Si. and was continued with three different subjects through the workshop. The subjects were The History of Google and The product of Google Indonesia, Indonesia Digital Consumers and Introduction of Youtube Indonesia.
The workshop was very interesting because all of the speakers are ITB alumni who work at Google Indonesia. In the first session, the speaker was Mrs. Fibriyani Elastria, Head of Consumer Marketing Google Indonesia, ITB Alumni of Architecture in 1996. From her experience and famous achievement on marketing, the students learned more about empathy process on how Google understand the customer needs, especially when they design the new product. The brief insight was how the product can give a solution to solve the problem in Indonesia. This session also explained how and people’s criteria to be employed by Google Indonesia. This moment was valuable for all of the students who have a dream to work in Google as their future career.
The second session was about Indonesia Digital Consumers. In this session, the speaker provided various kinds of information regarding marketing digitalization conducted by Google. Students got more excited because the speaker was Ms. Ariani Dwijayanti, strategy and insight manager of Google Indonesia. She is also known as SBM ITB alumni class of 2009. The students were enthusiastic in taking part in discussions. One of the discussions was about how Google provides entrepreneurial working environment. This session successfully opened student eyes and minds to focus more on pursuing digital business as a business opportunity.
The last session of the workshop was from Youtube Indonesia. Students were excited to get information about one of the most amazing video sharing websites that they use every day. The amazing thing in this session is the speaker, Geri Azzriel Siddik, Country Manager and Strategic Partnership of Youtube Indonesia. He is also Electrical Engineering ITB, alumni of 2005. Geri conducted active online learning to answer the quiz and the students were invited to play games “how much do you know about youtube”? Two winners were chosen and received unique merchandises from Youtube Indonesia. The session also explained Youtube system from time to time and also the innovation services that Youtube provides for users. After the workshop, the students were directed in a tour to experience working environment at Google office. First, they were invited to see trend board where there was a big screen to package information during the last 12 months of what searches are often sought by Indonesian people. After that, students were directed to a meeting hall and several office spaces. The spaces’ names are quite unique, showing Indonesia identity, such as Gado-Gado, Ondel Ondel, etc. There were also online meeting rooms. In this room employees can have online meetings with their colleagues or clients without having to meet at the office. The most interesting one was the micro kitchen in many areas in the office where free food and nibbles are available in order to fuel up the creative mind of workers. The students were amazed with the game and massage room which can be used for meetings and leisure. The last is the cozy cafe which can be used by all Google employees and it is all free. A lot of good and healthy foods were provided by Google. Many of the students were amazed by the interior design that Google created on their working space. In three words, we can describe that Google employees are very creative, innovative and inspiring. Overall, Google field trip has transformed the students’ knowledge in understanding more about digital business. Google has understood their users’ needs and provides service beyond their expectation. Realizing costumer desire by solving their problems is one of the important factors to push innovation and business sustainability.