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Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

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Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#61

Post by ethbr0 »

amelius wrote: post #25
_0o6v wrote: post #2

"You need to be able to answer the "what have you done for our users lately" question with "not much but I got promoted" and be happy with that answer to be successful in Corp-Tech." Good quote. Although you can extend the lawyers theme out to the rest of the bureaucratic corp too.

The problem with that question: who are the real users?

If the only user you can identify for the majority of your day-to-day tasks is "my boss" or "my boss's boss", then there's probably something wrong.

Everyone gets mandates from on high, but that shouldn't be all of one's work.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#62

Post by strken »

There's a pervasive belief by managers that involuntarily working weekends for an extended period of time will increase rather than decrease the total work done, and that engineering output can be measured in "hours", that I find absolutely ridiculous.

If I think back over the times when I've been most productive, I've had the kind of trusted flexibility that allows me to work 14 hours one day to get a feature in before the big demo, but also leave an hour early the next day to go catch up on all the real life stuff I didn't do. Reading the article, I get the impression the author is praising the 14 hour day while condemning the leaving early, which is failing to see that they're two sides of the same coin. I'm not going to work myself to exhaustion unless my manager helps facilitate it.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#63

Post by waheoo »

themarkn wrote: post #35
jpm_sd wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try managing a team where people take last minute personal days all the time, without having to give advance notice or a reason.

I mean, there’s an upper bound on how often that can happen (how many personal days people have). Those days are intended to be used at short notice. So if people using them is a problem for the team, imo the team is not correctly matched to the workload. I do think we often undersize our teams by ignoring the impact of vacation and personal time in taking on work ... but that’s not the fault of the people using the…

Sick days are compensation?

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#64

Post by Macha »

alexashka wrote: post #46

The author has a hard time telling apart what works, vs what aligns with his personality and energy levels. Not everyone who is an excellent contributor needs to be willing to work on weekends or have that 'go-getter' energy. The optimal path is one of optimizing for the path of least resistance, while this fella seems intent on rushing ahead, head first, until something breaks, or as he calls it, gets 'worn down'. O…

Yeah, my contract stipulates my working hours are monday to friday. This is what we agreed to when I started working. I will make an exception if the system is on fire (but don't expect me at 9am on Monday after it), but not for a management imposed deadline looking like it will be missed. That just encourages setting tighter deadlines to get more work out of employees.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#65

Post by isbvhodnvemrwvn »

_coveredInBees wrote: post #38
itg wrote: post #24

Another "leader" who complains about employees wanting work life balance and they are extremely entitled. These are the type of managers you want to avoid. I'm sure many Googlers are happy you left.

It's a good article with a lot of solid points, but that section had me rolling my eyes. Sure reads like someone pining for exploitative "startup" culture to get more than what they are paying for out of their employees. If you consistently feel the need to impinge on your employees weekends or PTO, that's a management failure, not an entitled employee problem.

There's also this lovely comment in the "focus" session where he plainly asserted that "privacy has no value to his users".

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#67

Post by shadowgovt »

mmcconnell1618 wrote: post #53
itg wrote: post #24

Another "leader" who complains about employees wanting work life balance and they are extremely entitled. These are the type of managers you want to avoid. I'm sure many Googlers are happy you left.

I think the author is correct that some big tech companies create a culture where going to 11am yoga is more important that crunching out a few more lines of code. He's correct that if your focus is on building and scaling product, this culture reduces the velocity of change. However, I see a couple of things the author is missing: 1) Work life balance is about employee long term retention and places like Google spen…

It's the sprint versus marathon mindset.

A small startup has a finite amount of time to either become a big company in their own right or do something so noteworthy that a big company sees the need to acquire them. Nothing else matters. There are minimal incentives to invest in the long-term welfare of your employees because in the long term, the company doesn't exist. You can't even guarantee that an acquisition will keep the employees you have invested in.

Large corporations like Google are incentivized to give their employees reasons to stick around. They can expect the company will be there in 30 years, and they can expect a good employee to put in a career's worth of work for them (and eventually have peer and mentorship contacts that encourage other good potential employees to join the company).

This is painting with a broad brush of how the incentives are structured... Not all big companies see it this way and not all small companies see it this way. But it's the behavior the marketplace appears to reward.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#68

Post by secondcoming »

itg wrote: post #24

Another "leader" who complains about employees wanting work life balance and they are extremely entitled. These are the type of managers you want to avoid. I'm sure many Googlers are happy you left.

If I swanned off to do yoga during my contracted core hours I'd be sacked

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#69

Post by wokwokwok »

themarkn wrote: post #35
jpm_sd wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try managing a team where people take last minute personal days all the time, without having to give advance notice or a reason.

I mean, there’s an upper bound on how often that can happen (how many personal days people have). Those days are intended to be used at short notice. So if people using them is a problem for the team, imo the team is not correctly matched to the workload. I do think we often undersize our teams by ignoring the impact of vacation and personal time in taking on work ... but that’s not the fault of the people using the…

I'm pretty sure it has nothing to do with leave days and team sizes; those things are probably perfectly fine.

The issue is:

> I don't believe long hours are a badge of honor but I also believe that we have to do whatever it takes to win, even if its on a weekend.

but, also...

> Yes, there is a challenge of how to compensate when there is no equity upside...

The complaint here is that people don't have 'skin in the game', so they dont care if the product succeeds, because it makes to difference to them; so they're taking personal days in a way that disrupts the (probably totally arbitrary) timelines and plans they have.

...so I mean, it's probably fair to say that if people are taking leave in a way that is disruptive, then that's more of an indicator that the team culture is totally screwed up than that there aren't enough people.

If one person wants to 'win' and everyone else a) doesn't care, b) that person has no power to punish them if the product doesn't 'win', c) there's no benefit to them personally if it does 'win'... well, its never going to work out for that one person in the long run.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#70

Post by [deleted] »

pyb wrote: post #49
jpm_sd wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no billionaire, but I am an Xoogler and his descriptions of employee entitlement and misaligned incentives are spot on.

Nothing he is saying is wrong, but this is entitlement as a VP : blaming everything on "corporate" rather than accepting your responsibility as a leader to fix those problems.

[deleted]
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