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

I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

mtlynch.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 250 posts

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#121

Post by iLoveOncall »

cdrini wrote: post #18

I'm not sure I agree with this. The breaking projects before completion is very annoying, but also the author seems like they were only there for a promotion? I mean a promotion is nice, but it was never really explained why that was such a dealbreaker. If the only thing keeping you at your job is the prospect of a better title, that's probably a bad sign. They then made a lifetime's worth of money at Google in four…

> the author seems like they were only there for a promotion?

Well, yes obviously? People get jobs to get money, and a promotion gives you more money.

The ones not aiming for a promotion are the strange ones, not the ones who are.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#123

Post by ahoka »

indigoabstract wrote: post #109
alarge wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, your manager doesn't decide your promotion. The difference between before and now is that before, your manager was expected to make the case for your promotion. Now, the manager is expected not to be an advocate, but to provide their balanced input (ready now, ready soon, not yet ready). The promotion still goes to a promo committee - although now they try to locate it close enough to your org that they have hear…

Will Google turn into a university next? Because this sounds to me a bit like how things work in academia. I think the push there is to publish, but the essence is that, for every decision, committees rule.

Google works like academia because that’s all the founders knew.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#125

Post by manmal »

ljm wrote: post #81
phyzix5761 wrote: post #64

I think you learned the most important lesson of any career: the customer is not your customer. The person/people who control your raise, bonus, and promotion are your real customers. Think about it like this. A customer is the entity that exchanges money for something they value; like a good or service. That's usually your manager. Or in the case of OP the promotion committee. (Many times it's both your manager and…

What you are describing is contracting, self-employment, consultancy, and those are orthogonal to having a career.

Why are you adding this distinction? Having done both, I can’t say I disagree with GP. Maybe I‘ve overlooked something.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#126

Post by WalterBright »

oblio wrote: post #104
WalterBright wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At one point Musk was within $100,000 of personal and business bankruptcy when Tesla ran short of funds.

Based on which source? Musk?

The biography "Elon Musk" by Vance.

https://www.amazon.com/Elon-Musk-Billionaire-SpaceX-Shaping/...

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#127

Post by WalterBright »

ouddv wrote: post #101
WalterBright wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At one point Musk was within $100,000 of personal and business bankruptcy when Tesla ran short of funds.

I would bet a substantial sum that Tesla was insolvent early in the m3. They suddenly were firing people all over the place and not paying many vendors, and paying others quite late. Additionally, the finance pros kept quitting right then.... I think it went bk, but Musk bet that he could hype up the stock enough to raise cash in the next offering and then pretend it never happened...

If you're that interested, read the Musk biography I linked to in this thread. It's a good read.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#128

Post by Simon_ORourke »

Etheryte wrote: post #8
shoo wrote: post #5

the same author has also published an interesting series of "annual review" blog posts summarising his progress trying to get different software businesses off the ground -- including being quite open about the finances. If you're interested in boostrapping a software business, and haven't seen them, they're well worth reading: https://mtlynch.io/tags/annual-review/ https://mtlynch.io/i-sold-tinypilot/

A good highlight of what quitting your job can look like: > Six years ago, I quit my job as a developer at Google to create my own bootstrapped software company. For the first few years, all of my businesses flopped. The best of them earned a few hundred dollars per month in revenue, but none were profitable. We often hear about the successes, and it is easy to be loud with success, but it's important to keep in mind…

> It's nice to see that for this author, three years in he did manage to find something that made money, but realistically most people don't have that much runway to keep at it without generating income.

Precisely this, and while I completely support the original author in their quest to find their own bootstrapped business, I keep wondering what the "what if" would have looked like had they stayed earning the big bucks in Google.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#129

Post by matwood »

teaearlgraycold wrote: post #25
nostrademons wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an interesting reality check that in 2023, six years into his journey as a bootstrapped founder, Tiny Pilot made $225K in profit on ~$1M on revenue. For 2021 and 2022, it made roughly a $5K profit; the rest was all losses. He quit Google because he couldn't get a promotion presumably from L4 to L5, but $225K is less than what an L4 makes. This might also be a microcosm of why the working class is pissed off in A…

You really shouldn't quit Google if your plan is to get rich. You should quit if you don't care too much about money and want more interesting work than being a cog in a lucrative machine.

Yeah. Google or any of the big techs are the lowest risk paths to economic stability and independence. Anyone with the ability to work on one should absolutely take it.

Re: I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

#130

Post by thdhhghgbhy »

f1shy wrote: post #120
thdhhghgbhy wrote: post #118

It's easy to get cynical about the review process. But just, for crying out loud, put yourself in the organisation's shoes. Tech is full of BS, and full of bullshitters. With the size of this organisation they need some consistent metrics, however not great these are, to assess and gauge performance versus other employees. You can't have the decision to promote in your manager's hands exclusively, they don't have the…

Let me try a short reply: if the manager needs to see what somebody is doing, he hast to look at it. Not look KPIs and metrics. KPI and easy metrics are for lazy bad managers.

I already mentioned above, direct managers don't have organisational visibility and can't decide among the hundreds who should be promoted and who shouldn't. The promotion request needs to go some central forum with objective criteria. This is not to say your manager can't represent you vigorously to this forum.
Post reply on HN