1. Why Adobe India is a Great Place to Work
Ajay Pande – VP, Product Development
© 2011 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All Rights Reserved. Adobe Confidential.

2. Proposition #1
What makes a company a
Great Place to Work depends
on who works there.
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3. Proposition #2
Who works at your company
depends on what kind of
company you are
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4. Proposition #3
Great companies need to
attract and keep the kind of
employees which make them
successful
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5. Conclusion
To be a great company, you
must be a Great Place to
Work for the kind of people
who will make you
successful
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6. Key strategic questions
 What kind of a company are we?
 What kind of people will make us successful?
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7. Everywhere you look
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8. Our Portfolio
TOOLS DELIVERY SERVERS & SERVICES
PLATFORMS
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9. What‟s the key to our success?
 Deep technology products that work robustly on hundreds of
millions of systems around the world
 No “specifications”
 Innovation and the creation of new markets
 No “long-term contracts”
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10. What kind of people are critical to our success?
 Innovative, deep technology engineers and product
managers
 Top computer scientists and product-oriented business
managers
 Need other top people as well
 Adobe India primarily a product development center
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11. What do these people want?
 Other smart people to work with
 Am I learning from my co-workers?
 The opportunity to make a difference to the world
 Am I having an impact?
 The opportunity to innovate
 Am I doing something new and interesting?
 Industry best practices, processes and environment
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12. Am I making a difference?
Everywhere you look
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13. Empowerment and “ownership” is really important
 Engineers want to determine future direction of product and
technology
 Not do “tasks” to someone else‟s directions
 Must have ability to influence strategy and direction
 For a remote office, it‟s important for teams to “own” what they
work on
 Learning: Must have local empowered teams
 Key message : people must feel they are making an
impact and are empowered to take decisions
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14. Am I innovating?
 Key questions:
 Am I in an innovative environment?
 Key question: is innovation happening around me? Are my peers
innovating?
 Must have role models and examples
 Lots of young people, need heroes
 Do my new ideas get support and help?
 Does the company really want me to innovate?
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15. Key innovation programs
 Product “Brainstorms”
 Whole team gets to contribute
 Management innovation reviews
 Set aside time for new ideas
 Review and approval of new ideas
 People get time and funding (and rewards) to pursue promising ideas
 Key learning: pick your innovators and support them
 Successful ideas need deep understanding of customers,
business and competitive environment
 Must have management attention and support
 Identify and incent highly innovative individuals
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16. Case study: Adobe India and the mobile revolution
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17. Key innovation programs contd.
 Patenting: an ideal fit for Adobe
 Adobe needs a strong patent portfolio
 Engineers dream of having patents
 Key learning: patent programs need extensive and long-
term support, both formal and informal
 Must have role models and examples
 Local legal support
 Major cash incentives and company-wide exposure
 Over 200 Adobe India patents
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18. Am I working with other smart people?
 Key questions:
 Am I working in a dynamic environment with smart people?
 Do I learn from my co-workers?
 Key learning: must know what you are looking for in your
people and do what it takes to find it
 We look for fundamental strengths, not temporary “technology
competencies”
 Need to create new technologies, not just be „competent‟ in existing
ones
 Attitude and brightness are most critical
 Long and rigorous hiring process
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19. Am I working with other smart people? -contd
 Key learning: must spread hiring knowledge through the
organization
 Consistent hiring across the organization
 Trusted core hiring team
 Everyone must know what we‟re looking for
 Everyone understands how we hire and often participates in
hiring
 Feel connected to incoming people
 Builds a culture of “Adobe hires great people”
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20. Industry-leading people practices are a must
 Compensation and benefits
 Appraisal and 360 degree feedback
 Small teams per manager, regular manager interaction and
goal-setting
 Learning and training opportunities
 Employee feedback and engagement surveys
 Higher education incentives
 Corporate Social Responsibility activities
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21. © 2011 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All Rights Reserved. Adobe Confidential.