Why Ex-Employees Are Glad They Sold Google

About a year before the IPO, Ayers started putting a business plan together for a new restaurant concept he came up with by looking at the market's inefficiencies and finding new solutions. He wanted to bring quick, healthy, local food to customers and also build a from-the-table Wi-Fi ordering system that would include a credit card slider for maximum efficiency.

Ayers, 40, left Google in May 2005, after opening 10 cafes at the Mountain View complex, and he has used $170,000 of his stock, as well as a few million dollars from private investors, to launch Calafia Café & Market a Go Go in Palo Alto, Calif., which will open this summer. He also has a cookbook, Food 2.0, coming out in April.

An in-demand company culture consultant, Ayers helps other Silicon Valley start-ups, like Ning and LinkedIn, by using what he learned at Google about keeping employees happy. "If you want productivity to go up and you want to have great morale," says Ayers, "food goes a long way."

In 2006, Ayers' consulting business brought in about $100,000. He spent 2007 focusing on his book and Calafia's launch and anticipates an exciting 2008. Once the restaurant is established, he plans to open five locations in the Bay Area and then start expanding nationally.

Lessons From Google

Daugherty's Denver-based Rent Marketer now has 15 employees, and the company's rental listings distribution service is being used across the country by about 10,000 property managers who create listings for $40 to $90 per property per month. In 2008, it'll add a site for renters, step up its marketing and roll out new features, like click-to-call.

Inspired by working at Google from its early days, Daugherty tries to inject what he learned there into his own company. He quantifies every piece of data he can, he pushes himself and his employees outside their comfort zones, he partners with and employs the best people he can and he even offers perks like bringing a massage therapist to the office every two weeks.

The biggest lesson he learned from Google, though, is not to spread himself too thin. He says, " Focus on one thing and do it very well."