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No, I still don't want to work for Google

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Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#351

Post by erre »

michaelochurch wrote: post #269
durin42 wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This statement out of michaelochurch is just silly. Most managers I know consider 20% time to be important to those engineers that desire taking it. That said, not everyone tries, and you can lose your ability to do 20% if you underperform. michaelochurch appears to have had a very strongly negative experience with his time at Google - I'd implore you (and everyone) to not base your assessment of what the company is…

Actually, my reason for spilling on Google is that someone from Google did something unethical after I left and Google refused to investigate (knowing they'd have to fire the person if they did). If Google had done the proper investigation and canned the person, I would never have said a word about them. I'm pretty much over it by this point, but I still think the terrorists who thought it would be fun to destroy Goo…

"If Google had done the proper investigation and canned the person, I would never have said a word about them."

I don't get this. The faults you mention here and elsewhere (closed allocation, lousy managers, unfairly rating expectations, 20% dooming you etc) have nothing to do with Google investigating unethical behaviour, right?

So, does Google really have none of these faults, but you say they do because they refused to investigate your claim; or do the really have these faults, but if they had investigated your claim, you would have kept quiet and let everyone think that it's a fantastic place (as far as you were concerned)?

(Serious question, I'm not trying to flame you. I just don't really understand how your various criticisms and this specific ethics issue are connected)

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#352

Post by vidarh »

jessedhillon wrote: post #348
baruch wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't quite support your position and am more in line with the parent one. It may be possible to find the "truly great" by a nice discussion but for those that are good and above it isn't so easy to separate them from the good talkers without some deeper technical discussion that gets started by an innocent technical question. The question is used to weed out the complete bozos and the deeper discussion to understa…

If the question were simply, am I going to go to company X or not, then sure let's do the bozo test to your satisfation. However, most candidates are going to have several options, and perhaps 7 or more opportunities that they want to chase down. In light of that, and considering that companies like Google want the person with 7+ opportunities chasing him/her, why grind them down by putting them through such an imper…

To your point about "7+ opportunities":

Last time I spoke to Google, I had two offers on the table from companies who contacted me after Google, before Google even managed to put me through a tech interview. They then proceeded to mess up the tech interview so badly that the recruiter got the result thrown out and got approval to bypass the whole thing. In the meantime said two companies invited me for dinner and lunch and an informal gathering to meet the teams I would manage if I said yes. In the end I ended up staying where I was, but Google was by far the easiest company to turn down: I didn't proceed through the second interview, because I didn't see the point when comparing the treatment I got.

This is what their rigid bureaucratic process results in. Perhaps Google would not have wanted me at the end of it, if I continued the process. But if so, then presumably any candidate they would want for that position would find it even easier than I did to line up other offers in the same time frame.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#353

Post by vidarh »

endtime wrote: post #196
vidarh wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Googles interviews had seemed to be remotely reasonable, I'm sure the people complaining would have been fewer. As it is, they seems very much to have the attitude that it doesn't matter if they weed out tons of great candidates as long as they weed out the bozos too. I once went through technical phone screening with them for a management position, and was bizarrely asked lots of probing questions about unix file…

>the attitude that it doesn't matter if they weed out tons of great candidates as long as they weed out the bozos too. What would you do if you got over 2 million applications a year for a few thousand positions?

I realize the problem. But their current approach has the outcome of alienating a lot of their target audience from even wanting to work there, or at the very least wanting to subject themselves to the hiring process.

The result is that a lot of people who are good enough to find it easy to find competitive jobs elsewhere self-selects out of the process, leaving the people who either really badly want to work specifically at Google, or who don't have other alternatives, in their hiring process.

The former group likely will contain lots of great people still, given that there's still a lot of people who see Google as a great place to work. The latter group likely isn't who they want.

Clearly the former group is not enough, given that Google has an army of recruiters who keep hassling a lot of us who have never applied to Google and/or who have turned them down for interviews or jobs before, or who have even worked for them and left.

They recognise they are losing out on a lot of good candidates, or they wouldn't have these people calling the same potential candidates over and over and over.

And from personal experience I know a lot of their recruiters are frustrated at how hard it is for them to fill many positions, and how often they approach candidates and are explicitly turned down because people don't consider it worthwhile subjecting themselves to their interview process when they can easily get jobs with competitive packages and terms elsewhere.

The last Google recruiter who contacted me called me to plead for me to do a second round management interview after I was lukewarm after the totally botched tech interview I've mentioned in this thread - she'd gotten approval to simply skip doing another tech interview completely after the tech interviewer did his ridiculous nonsense.

But who would I keep putting myself through that shit? No other potential employer, many of whom offer better terms than Google are likely to do, have ever tried to subject me to that type of employment process. I know I'm good at what I do. I'm used to being rapidly pursued with face to face interviews, being taken out for lunches and dinners, having the recruiter and potential employer actively sell me on the prospects and the benefits of working there, being told upfront exactly what I will work on and having them make it very clear that they can meet my salary and stock expectations. It's not that I need to be treated like some special snowflake, but I'd put a premium on working somewhere where I know I am appreciated.

Googles recruitment process scream "we don't care".

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#354

Post by vidarh »

varelse wrote: post #225
xenen wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem is the fact that we have two types of engineers: the academic geeks, and the creative geeks. I wouldn't give anyone a pass if they show no personality, creativity and out-of-the-box thinking with good product intuition during my interview. Vice versa, I don't think any academic geeks would give me a pass if I couldn't solve their math puzzles with a proof. I could be just talking out of my ass her…

In an interview, I have 30-60 minutes to figure out whether I want to hire you or not. My team writes a lot of code. Therefore, I'm going to ask you what your favorite language is and then test your ability to write 10-20 lines of code in that language to solve a relatively simple problem. If you can't do that, it seems to me that a) you don't like to write code and therefore I shouldn't hire you or b) you're out of…

Before you spend those 30-60 minutes, I want to know if you're worth working for. If you go straight into coding tests, I a) know you're not, b) expect you to be a formalistic stickler, c) I know you haven't done enough homework to at least have a reason to believe I am good enough to have plenty of options.

If you have done your homework when interviewing me, you'll understand that you need to sell me on your company, your team and the position first to let me assess whether you're worth my time.

The candidates who will bend over backwards to satisfy your coding tests before you've spent at least 20 minutes explaining why they should care, are the candidates who are fanboys and/or don't have other decent options. You should ask yourself why.

I've called off interviews and called the recruiter back to tell them I don't want to deal with that company again over interviewers who conducted bad technical interviews, for the reason that I know my value and I know the value of my time.

Conversely, when on the hiring end, I don't want candidates that are happy to bend over backwards for me without any sales effort first, or who don't ask me pointed questions about the company, the job, the terms. It makes me immediately suspicious about why they are willing to make such a big decision without sufficient information to evaluate if it would be a good fit for them.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#355

Post by vidarh »

_pferreir_ wrote: post #153
vidarh wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately, here in Europe things are starting to change for the worse. For very geographically specific values of "Europe". Lots of places are on the contrary seeing things improving. Europe isn't a single entity.

If a growth rate of 0.5% for the EU is not a good indicator of an economic slowdown, then you must be talking about Europa, Jupiter's moon. I know that EU Yes, I know some countries are doing better than others and that in some places unemployment is even decreasing, but taking into account the fact that Spain is on the verge of bankruptcy and countries such as France and Italy are being hit by austerity, I see no re…

Averages across hundreds of millions of people easily mask that substantial areas and sectors are thriving. Yes, it sucks if you're in low level jobs in the weaker markets. If you're in other sectors and markets you will instead be hounded by recruiters. The place I currently work, we have to be lightning quick when hiring these days, because the candidates we want get snapped up within a couple of days.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#356

Post by chris_wot »

frogpelt wrote: post #90
erikpukinskis wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I must be being dense. How is the title linkbaity? It's as close to a literal description of the article content as I can imagine. What should the title be?

It seemed like linkbait to me, too. It sounds like a slightly different version of "Why I left Google."

Hi. I submitted this article. Frankly, I don't think that skud ever expected this to get onto Hacker News. I'd never heard about her before her article - in fact I found out through David Gerard of Wikipedia fame via Facebook and I thought it was interesting enough to submit to HN.

I don't think there was anything intentionally link-baity about the title. It is what it is.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#357

Post by mattdeboard »

ilf10 wrote: post #345
nostrademons wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, YMMV. I was hired as a UI SWE, told my manager (repeatedly) that I wanted to do more backend algorithmic work, eventually refused to do any more UI work, then taught myself enough about Google Search's backend systems that I became known as a full-stack engineer that knows everything. It probably delayed my promotion by about a year, but it was worth it, and it's not like anyone stopped me. I'm now doing basic…

At google, you are thrust into a new environment, you are but a naked noogler, and your past a distant memory. Old, young, female, male, fat, skinny, likes sports, hates sports, prefers sushi, blah de dah, shut the hell up, no one gives a shit. It doesn't matter until you have proven yourself. A lot of problems come from when nooglers expect the world to do their bidding, but have nothing to show for it. At the end o…

Is this a joke? I don't get it.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#358

Post by chii »

kamaal wrote: post #326
tatsuke95 wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or utterly lunatic theories on experts I've read (and enjoyed) all of Gladwell's books. Outliers' theme revolved around the idea that in order to be good at anything you need to practice. It popularized the "10,000 hours" principle. I'm not sure how that qualifies as "lunatic". This is pop-media, not academic research; it's a good "jumping off" point. God forbid someone tries to be entertaining with their non-ficti…

The problem with the "10,000 hours" principle is may be you will be immensely successful following it. But don't be surprised if you don't. For you to be successful "10,000 hours" might be one of the many thing that need to fall in place. In many cases it might not even matter, to give you a simple example- If you are born in a society full of tribal wars in some poor country in Africa. I seriously doubt merely putti…

i doubt anyone is claiming that having 10,000 hours put into a skill/craft is going to make you successful. It's merely a pre-requisite, and not the only one at that.

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#359

Post by chii »

trhtrsh wrote: post #336
mietek wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Michael O'Church seems quite happy to share what went on. What's stopping you? Michael O'Church's arguments are internally consistent, and more persuasive than vague statements impugning his character.

> What's stopping you? Respect for the confidentiality of internal communications. Anyone is free to share their own impressions, but it is inappropriate to pull someone else's privileged documents and wave them in public.

what about anonymizing and cleaning the communication such that you cannot decipher any actual information, but can grasp the gist of the topic about which this thread discusses?

Re: No, I still don't want to work for Google

#360

Post by kabdib »

michaelochurch wrote: post #174
brown9-2 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you referring to Enron's stacked ranking practice? I don't think Google does anything approaching that.

At Google, "Perv" history is part of the transfer packet, which means that people with average political-success (sorry, I mean "performance") histories become immobile, creating a low-morale underclass that is good for mailing-list drama but bad for the company. It turns average employees and no-fault lack-of-fit cases into problem employees who have to be pushed out. It's disgusting, and people who believe this is…

This happens at Microsoft, too.

Have a bad year, get "underperformed". (I dare anyone to have a long career without having a bad year at some point).

Ding! Now it's really hard to move until you've scorched that badness from your record. Your mission is to get a bunch of good reviews, or get promoted, or find a sympathetic ex-manager who's willing to hire you anyway (this is why you need a network, and one reason why the "patron" mechanism emerged -- the patron model compensates for a broken review system and a bunch of busted policies that surround it).

I've been in the software biz 30+ years and I've had really horrible reviews 3-4 times. It can be devastating if you're in an organization run by robotic principles. [btw, I'm not a bozo. You only have my word for that, I know . . . but I'm not :-) ]

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