> The goal is to increase shareholder value

I know this is the "official" corporate governance imperative for a public company, but in practice this isn't how companies are run (or at least, not Google/etc). Sundar isn't thinking about "shareholder value"... he's thinking about how to make the company (and its employees) successful. Which of course, sometimes means cutting people loose.

In fact, American corporate ideology wasn’t always like this. The shareholder value mantra [0] emerged in the 70s as an excuse to justify any and all callousness convenient to management, no matter how unpalatable to society and everyone else. And now people all over this site and the world over repeat it as some sort of axiom of capitalism, which it is not. Before the Friedman Doctrine there was a very different understanding of the partnership between corporations and people.

[0] https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/equities/fri...

Google spent over $50 bill in the last 12 months buying back shares, ie handing money to it's shareholders. It fires people when costs are too high. He appears to try to have the company make more money. His actions suggest he is thinking about shareholder value all day long.

> Google spent over $50 bill in the last 12 months buying back shares, ie handing money to it's shareholders.

that's certainly one way to see it.

another way would be: Google spent over $50 bill in the last 12 months keeping its stock price up artificially.

Either way it appears Sundar is spending time thinking about shareholders and giving them what they want.

Ah yes, the ever important shareholder value.

Quite.