Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 141 posts

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#101

Post by strikelaserclaw »

rchaud wrote: post #73
infotainment wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s shocking he hasn’t been sacked yet. He’s completely incompetent, has led exactly zero successful initiatives, and has arguably trashed Google’s brand with constant product shutdowns.

> He’s completely incompetent, has led exactly zero successful initiatives, That's not what the stock ticker says. That's what the CEO's job is at megacorps, not "product innovation". Google has one core product, Ads. Everything else loses money.

Ah, so they decide to go the old boeing route, short term profits but long term deterioration.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#102

Post by VirusNewbie »

UncleMeat wrote: post #61
bossyTeacher wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying that "BigHead" kind of devs are doomed? And why does Google keep laying off people? You would think that they would do the relevant calculations and fire everyone they need to keep the costs down. The multiple rounds speaks of incompetency at Google. Given their unssuccessful attempts at besting OpenAi, it is not surprising. But still it is kind of scary to see how Google has become the old Microsoft a…

Hard to say if BigHead style devs are being affected here. Annual review ratings aren't quite yet finalized, so it is hard to know whether they could be used as input to a layoff system.

>Hard to say if BigHead style devs are being affected here. Annual review ratings aren't quite yet finalized

They aren't yet finalized, but pretty damn close. Don't you think this probably plays into it? VPs were likely told 'put 6% of your engineers below 'meets expectations', and some VPs probably thought about it and said "actually we have a really weak division, i'd rather axe that, than taking a 6% haircut across the board.

It makes sense, if you have a few teams of rockstars, a division of 'meh', and one weak director that has hired a few weaker managers who also hires weaker engineers, why give everyone the same PiP quota?

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#103

Post by VirusNewbie »

foofie wrote: post #24
rvz wrote: post #16

Engineers affected. The coasting day care is over and Google is in code red wartime mode in a state of panic. Sorry. The market is brutal and it does not care. No one is safe, not even Google.

In the last quarter Alphabet reported "total revenues of $76.69bn, an increase of 11 percent year-on-year (YoY)." Google Cloud alone grew 22%. https://erp.today/storm-clouds-for-google-as-q3-misses-analy...

yeah, and google cloud is hiring. They're winding down teams in non profitable areas.

I wish they were a little more strategic, but this time they are allowing affected team members to keep corporate access and apply internally to open roles.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#104

Post by jcuenod »

likewize wrote: post #49
bossyTeacher wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

will they? The job market is full of high quality experienced devs. I don't see why any company would hire for an inexperienced dev when they can get an experienced one for cheap. It's like buying Walmart cheese for $5 when you can get high end cheese for $10. No brainer

Oh wow, comparing cheese to developers is a pretty poor analogy.

It's with respect to the smell

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#105

Post by Zetobal »

pdav wrote: post #93
Zetobal wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft is too big to fail the perfect place for a shit ceo like Satya to just hold the finger in the wind and go with the flow.

What? Hasn’t Nadella been, like, a complete turnaround from the Ballmer years? Did you think Ballmer was onto something with Windows Mobile and not releasing Office apps for the web/iOS/android?

And you believe these were hard decisions? That's exactly the point everyone besides the stubborn ceo before would have made them.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#106

Post by alexeiz »

favabeanzzz wrote: post #63
bossyTeacher wrote: post #39

I wonder what does this mean for the "Everyone can code" movement (bootcamps, initiatives within Google and the like, government funding). They keep saying that you can get a high paying job if you do a 9 month course. When the best of the field are getting laid off, I wonder how long will the "Everyone can code" movement survive

Erm, who says the folks being laid off are the "best of the field?"

Supposedly Google only hires the best of the best. Now it appears they hired a lot of mediocrity? So much for their lauded hiring process.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#107

Post by talldatethrow »

codingdave wrote: post #51
bossyTeacher wrote: post #39

I wonder what does this mean for the "Everyone can code" movement (bootcamps, initiatives within Google and the like, government funding). They keep saying that you can get a high paying job if you do a 9 month course. When the best of the field are getting laid off, I wonder how long will the "Everyone can code" movement survive

That concept doesn't hold water. If everyone can code, it won't be a high paying skill. And soon, it will really be true that everyone can code. Schools are teaching computational thought as early as kindergarten, so the next generation is growing up with coding being a basic literacy skill. Of course, knowing how to code and being good at creating software are two different things. Just like knowing how to write and…

I keep hearing that schools are teaching 'computational thought' and programming, but then I also hear that kids can't do math at anywhere near the expected level, can't read at their expected level, and have zero attention span. Either someone is lying or very wrong.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#108

Post by UncleMeat »

VirusNewbie wrote: post #102
UncleMeat wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to say if BigHead style devs are being affected here. Annual review ratings aren't quite yet finalized, so it is hard to know whether they could be used as input to a layoff system.

>Hard to say if BigHead style devs are being affected here. Annual review ratings aren't quite yet finalized They aren't yet finalized, but pretty damn close. Don't you think this probably plays into it? VPs were likely told 'put 6% of your engineers below 'meets expectations', and some VPs probably thought about it and said "actually we have a really weak division, i'd rather axe that, than taking a 6% haircut acros…

For a number of reasons.

1. This wasn't just entire divisions. I've seen massive cuts on some teams and ticky-tack cuts elsewhere.

2. This was clearly coordinated above the VP level and could not have been just individual unilateral decisions by VPs who saw specific grad numbers coming through.

3. I've seen people who were not low performers get fired in this ticky-tack manner.

4. Nobody on my team was fired, but I sure as hell wasn't told "don't worry about expected distributions of low performers since we'll just cut from elsewhere."

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#109

Post by talldatethrow »

alexeiz wrote: post #106
favabeanzzz wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Erm, who says the folks being laid off are the "best of the field?"

Supposedly Google only hires the best of the best. Now it appears they hired a lot of mediocrity? So much for their lauded hiring process.

I've posted previously that I knew someone that went to one of the most joke low level public schools around (CSU East Bay - I audited a few classes with them even), and they were so goofy you had to help the through understanding the movie plot of basic movies even. They were fun to hang out with, but honestly pretty goofy. They were also a bit lazy, never really learning much about their field.

They were hired as a product manager by Google, based on their years of being a scrum master or whatever at a few other bay companies.

Re: Tell HN: Google-Wide Layoffs

#110

Post by sk11001 »

bossyTeacher wrote: post #39

I wonder what does this mean for the "Everyone can code" movement (bootcamps, initiatives within Google and the like, government funding). They keep saying that you can get a high paying job if you do a 9 month course. When the best of the field are getting laid off, I wonder how long will the "Everyone can code" movement survive

Recently the only people who have been saying that it’s easy to become a programmer in a few months are the ones selling you the way to get there.
Post reply on HN