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Google Paid This Man $100 Million

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Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#51

Post by flyinglizard »

richcollins wrote: post #49
flyinglizard wrote: post #34

Reading this, his compensation is the least amazing part. If this article is true, it should have been titled "A Story Of Competence". Does anyone have any doubt the guy is generating Google this money many times over? It's simple math. It has nothing to do with curing cancer, economical equality or anything else. He's something that's worth X and pays back many X. I can understand why this comes as a shock to some;…

The important consideration are the alternatives. He may easily create that much value but are there other people (substitutes) that could create as much or nearly as much for far less than 100M?

Being that there aren't many people with this ability, and that there are absolutely no indicators as to their performance apart from letting them do the job over a prolonged period (as many companies hiring hotshots discovered), and that the position is directly responsible for billions in revenue - I'd say that it's not realistic to expect a drop in replacement.

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#52

Post by robrenaud »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #13
capred wrote: post #3

Does anyone know if these types of $100M numbers are actually true? I think it makes a great headline but wouldn't everyone at senior ranks get packages like this making it unsustainable?

It does seem likely that some tricks were involved to arrive at a sensational number. But if Google pays an average engineer on the order of $100,000 , this is 1000 times the average annual salary as a one time bonus. That seems exceptional, certainly, but not completely insane. On the flip side, it might keep a certain type of engineer for bolting for a startup. Even the most optimistic entrepreneur knows the odds o…

Google pays a starting engineer fresh out of college that much salary, and then there is stock and bonus incentive compensation.

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#53

Post by vacri »

777466 wrote: post #41
avenger123 wrote: post #20

This is a classic story of really good negotiation. Getting the very serious offer from Twitter was the best thing to happen to Neal. I can only imagine the negotiation with Google that he must of had. It probably went on the lines of something like this - "Hey, I really love it here at Google. I am really excited with what we are working on and want to deliver it but this Twitter offer is just something that I can't…

Serious question: does the sweetened language, how you couch the situation really make a difference to decision makers?

I think when you start talking about the financial future of your family, it makes more sense when you're a line employee. But when you're on a salary well into the six figures, it sounds disinegenuous (to me) to say "we're struggling here". By all means go for "hey, I'm in demand and thinking of moving - business is business", but "I'm moving because I'm concerned about my personal finances"?

But then again, I'm not the guy who does salary negotiations...

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#54

Post by vacri »

cridal wrote: post #16

Wow. Definitely, an interesting reading. And a special guy, no question about it. On the other hand, the guy didn't cure cancer. Doesn't it give anyone pause to thin that the topic of conversation is 'ads'? You know, those little annoying things you would never click, and which get in the way of your normal life. I mean we're talking about billions of dollars. So much human talent, skill, intelligence taken away from…

This guy facilitated the ads that support google's wide range of quality services given free to anyone anywhere in the world. Google maps alone has had a positive humanitarian impact to a great many people. It's not the stereotypical marketing exec in an advertising company that only makes adverts.

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#55

Post by hyperbovine »

wallflower wrote: post #24

This is a job for life and then some. If you compare this with full professorship (academic tenure), that will cost the university about $4 million (assuming $60k/yr - probably $6-7 million if the university is upper echelon). So conservatively this is 10-15x what tenure is. Neal Mohan sounds like the business equivalent of Jeff Dean [1] [1] http://research.google.com/people/jeff/

Ahem. This is 10-15x the money portion of tenure. You still have to think about advertising all day every day. I'd take the tenure.

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#56

Post by zevyoura »

vacri wrote: post #53
777466 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question: does the sweetened language, how you couch the situation really make a difference to decision makers?

I think when you start talking about the financial future of your family, it makes more sense when you're a line employee. But when you're on a salary well into the six figures, it sounds disinegenuous (to me) to say "we're struggling here". By all means go for "hey, I'm in demand and thinking of moving - business is business", but "I'm moving because I'm concerned about my personal finances"? But then again, I'm not…

At the level being discussed here, I don't think it's a question of avoiding struggle, but rather of ensuring your family's wealth for generations to come. It would be difficult to turn down such an offer, especially if the work would still be interesting.

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#57

Post by dyno12345 »

flyinglizard wrote: post #34

Reading this, his compensation is the least amazing part. If this article is true, it should have been titled "A Story Of Competence". Does anyone have any doubt the guy is generating Google this money many times over? It's simple math. It has nothing to do with curing cancer, economical equality or anything else. He's something that's worth X and pays back many X. I can understand why this comes as a shock to some;…

Is there reason to believe that successful executives are not like successful traders, in that they behave better than chance?

That is, if you make 10,000 people executives and make them make decisions by flipping coins, won't 100 of them be in the top 1% even if success is the result of successive chance outcomes?

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#58

Post by 777466 »

zevyoura wrote: post #56
vacri wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think when you start talking about the financial future of your family, it makes more sense when you're a line employee. But when you're on a salary well into the six figures, it sounds disinegenuous (to me) to say "we're struggling here". By all means go for "hey, I'm in demand and thinking of moving - business is business", but "I'm moving because I'm concerned about my personal finances"? But then again, I'm not…

At the level being discussed here, I don't think it's a question of avoiding struggle, but rather of ensuring your family's wealth for generations to come. It would be difficult to turn down such an offer, especially if the work would still be interesting.

then there is http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1986/...

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#59

Post by samstave »

hyperbovine wrote: post #55
wallflower wrote: post #24

This is a job for life and then some. If you compare this with full professorship (academic tenure), that will cost the university about $4 million (assuming $60k/yr - probably $6-7 million if the university is upper echelon). So conservatively this is 10-15x what tenure is. Neal Mohan sounds like the business equivalent of Jeff Dean [1] [1] http://research.google.com/people/jeff/

Ahem. This is 10-15x the money portion of tenure. You still have to think about advertising all day every day. I'd take the tenure.

I am completely naive to what you just said, may you please explain like I am five? [I am dead serious]

Re: Google Paid This Man $100 Million

#60

Post by avenger123 »

vacri wrote: post #53
777466 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question: does the sweetened language, how you couch the situation really make a difference to decision makers?

I think when you start talking about the financial future of your family, it makes more sense when you're a line employee. But when you're on a salary well into the six figures, it sounds disinegenuous (to me) to say "we're struggling here". By all means go for "hey, I'm in demand and thinking of moving - business is business", but "I'm moving because I'm concerned about my personal finances"? But then again, I'm not…

I appreciate your point of view and to some extent I definitely concur.

I think that's the difference between a professional and an amateur.

Saying something along the lines of - "hey, I'm in demand and thinking of moving - business is business" even if its true, kinda just would make any company want to kick the person to the curve. Maybe not at that moment, but believe me, that person is now on some blacklist. As IT people (and yes, I am generalizing here) we don't fully appreciate the power of being blunt without being blunt. A lot of it has to do with saving face for both sides. It's a skill I even have to work on but for the people that I have seen that are very good at it, they are very effective with their work.

It's like doing a deal with salesperson and afterwards you realize that you maybe got screwed a little bit, but gosh darn it, you still like that salesperson quite a bit. I guess this falls under charisma.

In terms of the financial future, I don't think anyone is talking about anybody struggling in these positions. I wasn't implying that in my statement. What I was implying was that given any rational person (even one with millions), having a choice between making 10x more or 5x more or staying the same, all other things equal, it would be hard to not consider the choice. Money is Money. And, one thing about people that have made the millions, they still tend to consider every dollar as important as the next, since they realize quite rightly how hard it is to make money.

It's very likely that Neal was facing this 5x-10x type of multiplier. I do think that when you are facing the 0.5x-2x multiplier than the decision does become much harder.

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