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I worked at Google for -10 days

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Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#351

Post by BowBun »

mschild wrote: post #22
sashank_1509 wrote: post #7

There’s no great solution to this apart from the economy and company doing well so that this doesnt happen. I’ll lay out the reasons below: 1. Let’s say we pass a law that prevents offers from being revoked. This will make hiring much harder and increase 5 rounds to like 10 and involve many more committees and even then most candidates other than sureshots getting rejected. 2. Ban revoking offers only for overseas em…

On a general level sure maybe, but for this particular case, there was little economical need for Google to have any layoffs. They're swimming in money and are highly profitable. Pulling the rug out underneath a new employee who is days away from starting and moving his whole life to a new country is simply shitty behaviour.

I get that the HN crowd is sensitive to FAANG layoffs. That being said, it's hard to take seriously an anonymous comment claiming they know better than Google's executive board about whether or not they needed layoffs. Unless you were in those discussions, your ideas probably come from the same blog posts posted to HN in the last 6 months.

I don't stand to gain anything from defending them, but can we drop the hubris that almost any of us knows how these decisions are made at that level? I'm sure there's a C-suite or two skimming HN every once in a while, but most of us are regular old tech employees slinging code and talking to customers.

That doesn't make it any less awful for the people involved, and I feel for their situations.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#352

Post by licebmi__at__ »

maxlamb wrote: post #322
RussianCow wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's that uncommon. I have personally worked at two companies that didn't do the background check until after employment (which I would never do again), and I've heard this anecdote a few times from others.

Were these companies startups or outside the U.S.? I’ve never heard of a big company doing a background check after start date, that makes no sense.

Bank of America did this for outside US contractors.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#353

Post by ghaff »

conductr wrote: post #347
saagarjha wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your company is doing the something that is legal but still a jerk move.

Not really, they could be exposed to risk and it's typical to just pay you for the 2 weeks and cut off access so the risk is mitigated

Not paying out the 2 weeks would be sort of a jerk move. But simply cutting a check and saying "It's been good having you" as they show you the door is perfectly reasonable in some circumstances.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#354

Post by blcknight »

sebzim4500 wrote: post #95
blcknight wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Having an offer rescinded for 'business reasons' is unbelievably annoying, and the author has my sympathy. That said, it's kind of understandable too. Things happen. It's not understandable, Google is doing financially fine. If they determine they made a mistake they should have to pay a penalty. You would not get that grace in your own personal life, I don't know why we grant it to companies in employment contract…

The candidate can also accept the offer and then take a job somewhere else without penalty, so it is at least symmetric.

That is not symmetric.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#355

Post by gorbachev »

bagacrap wrote: post #304
xooglechoogle wrote: post #56

Entities with massive wealth, such as Google, should always use money to soften the blow of their mistakes. Giving this person a small chunk of cash would make me respect Google so much more than just screwing this person's life up and saying "Whoops, you're fired, lol!" But it's been a long time since Google was a cool company.

No mention of the relocation bonus. Was there one? Did they rescind that as well? Since I'm 90% sure Google would pay for international relocation, and the blog post didn't mention it (which it surely would have if Google had offered then rescinded one), I suspect he did get to keep that.

Those don't get paid in advance. They're paid as part of your paycheck.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#356

Post by yebyen »

ghaff wrote: post #353
conductr wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, they could be exposed to risk and it's typical to just pay you for the 2 weeks and cut off access so the risk is mitigated

Not paying out the 2 weeks would be sort of a jerk move. But simply cutting a check and saying "It's been good having you" as they show you the door is perfectly reasonable in some circumstances.

The risk isn't that you'll call them a jerk, it is that when your new job falls through, your old job can no longer credibly claim that you left voluntarily because they moved your quit date. You were fired. So you'll be able to claim unemployment and the business' unemployment insurance premiums could rise.

It's bound to be cheaper to pay the two weeks than to pay the increase in unemployment insurance premiums for every remaining employee in perpetuity. In that sense, it's short-sighted to not pay you through your notice period.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#357

Post by hikawaii »

mschild wrote: post #22
sashank_1509 wrote: post #7

There’s no great solution to this apart from the economy and company doing well so that this doesnt happen. I’ll lay out the reasons below: 1. Let’s say we pass a law that prevents offers from being revoked. This will make hiring much harder and increase 5 rounds to like 10 and involve many more committees and even then most candidates other than sureshots getting rejected. 2. Ban revoking offers only for overseas em…

On a general level sure maybe, but for this particular case, there was little economical need for Google to have any layoffs. They're swimming in money and are highly profitable. Pulling the rug out underneath a new employee who is days away from starting and moving his whole life to a new country is simply shitty behaviour.

Money needs to have a return, even internally. Saying "we can afford it" buys you goodwill, but the same way employer goodwill towards employees shifts with the wind, so does consumer and employee sentiment.

People do not generally pick their grocery cart or smartphone based on how the brand makes them "feel". Upper middle class professionals with six figure plus salaries might, but they are far in the minority.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#358

Post by alberth »

We’re had ~15 years of a booming global economy.

Many people haven’t experienced economic slowdowns.

While my heart goes out to this person, you have to look at this also from the companies perceptive - it’s way easier to “layoff” someone who hasn’t started their job yet vs. someone who’s been with the company for sometime.

I’m not saying that makes it ok what happened. It’s just that during a slowing economy, there’s no good way to prevent innocent people from getting impacted.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#359

Post by exe163 »

bagacrap wrote: post #304
xooglechoogle wrote: post #56

Entities with massive wealth, such as Google, should always use money to soften the blow of their mistakes. Giving this person a small chunk of cash would make me respect Google so much more than just screwing this person's life up and saying "Whoops, you're fired, lol!" But it's been a long time since Google was a cool company.

No mention of the relocation bonus. Was there one? Did they rescind that as well? Since I'm 90% sure Google would pay for international relocation, and the blog post didn't mention it (which it surely would have if Google had offered then rescinded one), I suspect he did get to keep that.

I am pretty sure for most corporations you get the bonus after you moved, unless they contracted a relocation company and you accepted their service.

Re: I worked at Google for -10 days

#360

Post by alanfranz »

efitz wrote: post #341
chihuahua wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At Microsoft, the standard practice is that if you say you're leaving to take a job a company they consider a competitor, they cut off all your access at the end of the day, even if your manager wants you to stick around for knowledge transfer. If it's not a competitor, it's up to you how much notice you want to give. If you say you're leaving but don't say who your next employer is, they assume it's a competitor. Fa…

I can confirm based on my experience that at Microsoft, depending on a lot of factors like your level, role, information you have access to, and where you’re going, that they may terminate immediately as soon as you give them notice. Amazon has rapid termination processes as well but I’m not as clear on their criteria. If you work for a big technology company and are jumping to a perceived competitor, and/or if you h…

> that they may terminate immediately as soon as you give them notice.

Which is nonsense, because it’s the employee that chooses when to tell the employer. If I want to exfiltrate confidential data, I’ll do it first, then I resign.

It’s different on layoffs, where disgruntled employees could break havoc.

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