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Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

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Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#151

Post by user5994461 »

20years wrote: post #30
fdsfsaa wrote: post #13

This guy is sad. All those people on Quora who ask unending questions about Google are sad. They're suckers. They've eaten up Google's marketing. You want to know the reality? Whatever's special about Google is long gone. Management let the smoke out a long time ago. Nowadays, Google is just another big software company, with all the opaque politics, purposelessness, and random nonsense that comes with being a big co…

I too don't understand the appeal of working for Google and the likes but I am not sure I would consider this guy sad. It feels like he may partly be doing this as confirmation to himself of his worth. The fact that he has started 2 successful businesses both of which are still generating revenue is what he should be looking at for confirmation. That is hard and a skill that many developers will never acquire. He may…

I too don't understand the appeal of working for big tech companies.

Until a recruiter from Facebook contacted me and sent me a list of teams at Facebook to pick the ones I'd be interested in.

http://imgur.com/9p7QJ5s (just an excerpt)

Then I figured out there aren't many places in the world where I could do cache infrastructure "to handle over a billion requests per second" or storage datacenters to store "350+ million photos uploaded per day to Facebook -the largest photos site on the Internet-".

Next thing you know. I'm interviewing at yet-another-big-company. Damn, they got me with their marketing //(^-^)//

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#152

Post by savanaly »

elbear wrote: post #134
savanaly wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's true if the goal is purely money. I think, though, that if you're just looking to make six figures and don't quite care if it's 150k or 500k then working at a Google or Facebook will be the far better alternative as the workplace culture is better and the hours are likely to be better. For a lot of (most?) engineers, there's not enough money in the world to offset the difference in utility from working at a fi…

The work in finance can also be intellectually stimulating.

Of that I have no doubt, but I think on average the perception is that you are giving up your quality of life for money by going to finance.

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#153

Post by SiVal »

ArlenBales wrote: post #130
msoad wrote: post #106

I worked at Google. This makes me sad. Sad to see people are treating a for profit company like a religion. Google is a good workplace compared to other companies but it's not a religion and it's not perfect. As other commenters said it's not the thing it was before either. I left Google to work on something more interesting and I can't be happier. If we're going to hire people, I'm not putting any weight on their wo…

People spend years at medical school or law school to become a doctor or lawyer. I don't see the big deal at devoting a huge amount of concentrated time and effort to being an engineer at Google. If you got the free time and willpower (and the author does), more power to you. If he doesn't get the job, he's still got the knowledge. And 8 months is nothing compared to multiple years in college.

The med school and law school knowledge is equally applicable to any med or law career, because you are studying for a certification exam that is independent of employer. Even if you choose to employ yourself (private practice), you'll have to pass those exams.

The Google study emphasizes what Google tests for, not what you need for the profession. If you start your own software company, for example, is the Google material critically important?

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#154

Post by surrey-fringe »

bshimmin wrote: post #9
minimaxir wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are very many engineers (e.g userbase of /r/cscareerquestions) whose sole purpose in life is to get a job at one of the Big 4.

I can perhaps understand that sort of attitude from people fresh out of their computer science degree, or even after half a dozen years of miserable grind in the workforce - but this guy looks to be in his forties, has (apparently) already had a successful career... and yet he has a blog called "Googley as Heck" and his LinkedIn headline is "Future Googler". Is this not all a bit weird?

Weird for anyone else, yes. For him it's just a networking front.

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#156

Post by user5994461 »

savanaly wrote: post #152
elbear wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The work in finance can also be intellectually stimulating.

Of that I have no doubt, but I think on average the perception is that you are giving up your quality of life for money by going to finance.

Working in finance:

1) Go to finance for the money

2) Stay there because work and people are interesting

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#157

Post by eigenvalue »

cm2187 wrote: post #136
msoad wrote: post #106

I worked at Google. This makes me sad. Sad to see people are treating a for profit company like a religion. Google is a good workplace compared to other companies but it's not a religion and it's not perfect. As other commenters said it's not the thing it was before either. I left Google to work on something more interesting and I can't be happier. If we're going to hire people, I'm not putting any weight on their wo…

It reminds me of graduates who want to get into investment banking. They have a ranking in their head of which bank is better than which other, and make a massive deal out of getting into #2 instead of #1 or #3. The reality is that down to #10, they will likely get a very similar experience and chances are they will have gone through 2 or 3 of those banks on their list anyway by the time they are 30. And at the end o…

There is signalling content associated with being at the number 1 bank (and a top group within that bank for that matter; e.g., the financial institutions group at Goldman Sachs). If you planned on staying at an investment bank for your whole career then this might not be so important. The majority of people who start these jobs hope very much to jump ship as soon as possible to work on the buy side (hedge fund or private equity), and in that regard the signalling content is very important because there are so many good candidates for any available spots.

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#158

Post by ceras »

user5994461 wrote: post #143
morgante wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's questionable whether you'll make more money as a developer in finance than at Google. It'll certainly require a lot more politics and careful planning.

Depends on the location. Depends on your profile. Smart techs go to tech companies. Smart & ambitious techs go to finance. If you're at Google, you certainly won't participate in conversations with coworkers about how Google just tried to poach you with an offer soooo ridiculously low it's laughable.

Any chance you can share more info? I'm very curious.

It's certainly true that almost all finance software jobs pay much less than the big tech companies, and I've yet to personally run into one that clearly paid more (at best, similar or slightly more for some but not all algo trading). So I never exactly know what these comments mean.

Which are the big payers -- just algo trading? -- and does everyone get paid that much or just the high performers, or even just the high performers at the high performing firms? How does high performer compensation compare to high performer compensation at tech companies (who start at, say, $400K-$500k for what I'll call "entry-level high performer")?

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#159

Post by ijustdontgetit »

amirmc wrote: post #150
ArlenBales wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People spend years at medical school or law school to become a doctor or lawyer. I don't see the big deal at devoting a huge amount of concentrated time and effort to being an engineer at Google. If you got the free time and willpower (and the author does), more power to you. If he doesn't get the job, he's still got the knowledge. And 8 months is nothing compared to multiple years in college.

> People spend years at medical school or law school to become a doctor or lawyer. True, but both of those are professions . Qualifications that you carry irrespective of your employer. Being 'a Google engineer' is not the same thing, although people might like to imagine it is.

What is it then?

Re: Why I Studied Full-Time for 8 Months for a Google Interview

#160

Post by jiaweihli »

antoniuschan99 wrote: post #92
yongjik wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I understand the plan: 1) If he's not hired, how is he going to sell his service? People will say "He couldn't even get himself hired!" 2) If he is hired and does a side job of teaching others for Google Interview, that's a gigantic conflict of interest (and probably a breach of NDA). He will be fired. Is he planning to get hired, quit on the spot, and then start his tutoring service? (Well, stranger thi…

If he is hired, doesn't Google make you sign a contract that says all your work is now owned by Google?

IANAL, but I've heard in California at least, companies can't claim ownership over work you do on your own time on your own resources, that don't directly compete with the company.

Of course, things get muddier since Google does almost everything. But I doubt they'd want to engender ill will by suing an ex-employee for ownership.

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