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I quit Google to work for myself (2018)

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

#141

Post by taneq »

shadowgovt wrote: post #30
asdfman123 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will you work for me as a software engineer? I'll pay you $20 an hour, which is vastly more than nearly all of your ancestors throughout history have made. Why is it a dealbreaker? Don't you enjoy software engineering? My point is that human psychology doesn't work that way. You compete with people around you. If they're getting promoted while you're being left behind, you're not going to be very happy about it.

Actually, that varies from person to person. I've been fine not being promoted (less time doing the self-reporting monkey-dance leaves more time to work on projects), and I make enough to satisfy my material needs and desires. And at most startups, there's nowhere to be promoted to when you're a double-digit hire. There's just the work and the chance of a cash-out (or of changing the world, whatever gets you up in th…

> And at most startups, there's nowhere to be promoted to when you're a double-digit hire.

This is something I'd assumed every engineer-type person faces sooner or later. Unless you're in a massive corp with hundreds of engineers, there's only maybe two or three tiers of engineering roles. That's two promotions, ever, unless you want to be promoted out of engineering and into management. So if you want to stay technical, instead of chasing higher status job titles, you have to chase higher status projects.

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

#142

Post by aix1 »

joshuamorton wrote: post #73
rockemsockem wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no longer senior, it's only L4 (new hires are usually L3). Also I never knew the time length for the cliff, but I think it was really, really long.

It also wasn't, as far as I know, every strictly enforced. There were folks when I joined (which was when the L5 requirement still existed, but it was in its way out) who had been L4 for like a decade.

Right, while there was a "growth" expectation for L4s written into the SWE job ladder, there were no fixed timelines. Enforcement varied from org to org: at least one of my previous orgs periodically conducted talent reviews, specifically looking at cases like long-tenured L4s to decide whether to intervene.

That was before the layoffs started. One of my by then ex-reports, who was a very talented and knowledgeable but not at all career-focused long-time L4s got laid off in one of the rounds. :(

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

#143

Post by aix1 »

iLoveOncall wrote: post #121
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.

I'd say that's a rather narrow way to look at it.

I know more than a handful of folks who are very happy with their level of responsibility and comp, and don't want higher expectations and more stress even if it would bring in significantly more cash. I personally think that's a pretty healthy way to look at it. Not everything in life is about money.

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

#144

Post by throwaway215234 »

throwaway_5753 wrote: post #37
asdfman123 wrote: post #32

This is also why I'm thinking about leaving Google. I have little to sit through meetings, try to pawn necessary work off to others, and play the game while there's a hundred small tasks that my project desperately needs me to get done. I can jump ship and make $50-100k/yr more because the next place I work will actually value my experience, even though it's technically much more useful to Google.

Where will you go that will be a 50k-100k bump over google comp?

Google comp is known to be low. Top candidates with in-demand skills can easily ask for 2x TC of google and get a stream of offers pouring in.

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

#145

Post by aix1 »

1024core wrote: post #19
davidfiala wrote: post #3

> Your manager doesn’t promote you? > No, managers at Google can’t promote their direct reports. They don’t even get a vote. > Instead, promotion decisions come from small committees of upper-level software engineers and managers who have never heard of you until the day they decide on your promotion. AIUI, nowadays in 2022+ the manager gets the only vote.

What I found neat (when I heard about it) was that one could nominate yourself for promo, without your manager's assent. This is quite rare and a neat feature.

In theory, yes. In practice, it would take some pretty extraordinary circumstances for one to get promoted without their manager's support.

For starters, even if it is the candidate themselves who self-nominate, it is still the manager who writes the promo readiness assessment that forms the main body of the packet. It is also the manager's job to solicit peer feedback and represent it to the committee.

One could imagine a scenario where the manager's opinion diverges sharply from the assessment of the session lead and other senior folks sitting on the committee (who decide collectively) but again, those would be some pretty exceptional circumstances...

Layered on top of this are promo quotas, which already mean that some folks who do tick all the boxes aren't getting promoted as soon as they would be otherwise (or at all). That is to say that there are lots of headwinds even if the manager is supportive, let alone when they aren't.

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

#147

Post by aix1 »

jeffbee wrote: post #34
davidfiala wrote: post #3

> Your manager doesn’t promote you? > No, managers at Google can’t promote their direct reports. They don’t even get a vote. > Instead, promotion decisions come from small committees of upper-level software engineers and managers who have never heard of you until the day they decide on your promotion. AIUI, nowadays in 2022+ the manager gets the only vote.

At all levels? I know it changes every year so I don't let my own personal experience color my perception of Google 2024, but some years when I was there my manager barely even knew where my desk was. My promo packets for L5 and L6 were judged by peer committees and I am not sure they even saw my manager evaluations. When I sat on an L5 promo committee we did not weigh manager assessments. This made sense at that tim…

These days it's the manager who writes the next-level assessment (NLA) and it's the NLA that forms the main body of the packet that the promo committee looks at. They're also the one soliciting and summarizing peer feedback etc.

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

#148

Post by hugodan »

“I quit myself to work for Google” is the most common pattern but not as much spoken about. We can see the side effects of it in posts like these and countless others that come with forced contraptions as ways to justify having quit Google.

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

#149

Post by cmrdporcupine »

I_AM_A_SMURF wrote: post #106
disqard wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assure you that Imposter Syndrome is a daily reality even for Senior Engineers at Google.

I thought once I reached Staff at Google it would go away. It in fact made it even worse now that I have a whole slate of incredible peers to compare myself to.

The internal culture at Google outright fosters it. Everything from the interview process on.

My mental health is 5x better since leaving.

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

#150

Post by cmrdporcupine »

rockemsockem wrote: post #59
spwa4 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The amount of time is very long It is now, it used to be a lot shorter. "Up or out" has effectively been sacrificed to cost savings, which is perhaps a good thing in some ways.

What did it used to be?

When I started in 2011 I was told "up or out" of L4 by 4 years.

That was dropped around 2015 or 2016.

I stayed for 10 years at L4 then left on my own. I had no interest in the perf game and never attempted promotion. L4 money was good enough.

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